Downtown Detroit on the right path to revival but has a long way to go

John Gallagher | Detroit Free Press

So many groundbreakings and announcements of new projects have popped up in greater downtown Detroit lately that one might be tempted to think downtown's revival is, well, almost finished.

Don't believe it. As promising as all these new projects may be, downtown Detroit still has a long way to go before it's even close to being the lively dense urban center it promises to be.

That's important to keep in mind as we debate the "Two Detroits" — the lively downtown where so much is happening versus the often neglected neighborhoods that cry out for solutions to poverty and joblessness.

I think pitting downtown versus the neighborhoods misses the mark on both. It ignores that good things are happening in many neighborhoods — not enough by a long shot, of course — while even downtown remains in the early stages of its revival.

The policy implications are clear: We can't take our foot off the gas in either downtown or the neighborhoods. We have years, if not decades, of hard work ahead of us to get Detroit to where we want it to be.

So, for today, let's look at what downtown still needs.

Projects already announced

Start with the new projects. Multiple new developments have been announced, but most are yet to be started or, if under construction, finished.

Dan Gilbert's Hudson's site project is under construction but remains mostly a big hole in the ground at this point, scheduled to finish in 2022 or so. His next big project, a series of buildings on the Monroe Block, will break ground this fall, but that, too, will take a few years to finish.

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Then, too, the half-dozen new residential projects announced over the last year or so by the Ilitch family's Olympia Development to rise near Little Caesars Arena are yet to begin construction. Also, Ford's remake of the Michigan Central Station also won't be ready until 2022 or thereabouts.

And those 1,200 or so new residential apartments Mayor Mike Duggan and Gilbert's team announced recently in the Brush Park area immediately north of downtown are just a promise at this point. It will take a few years to actually build them.

The city's waterfront revival has been remarkable in recent years. But the city's planned 22-acre west riverfront park won't be ready for another few years yet, and the extension of the RiverWalk across from the old Uniroyal site nearer Belle Isle is yet to get done. Lots of work to do there, too.

A lot of parking lots

Beyond all that new construction still ahead of us, downtown also needs to resolve what to do with all its vacant parcels and surface parking lots.

I was shocked recently when, reviewing the City of Detroit's parcel database of more than 800 properties in the immediate downtown, to see that roughly half of them have no buildings on them. Many or most of those are parking lots, but there's still many parcels with not even that use on them, particularly on the edges of downtown.

Serving life's necessities

And there's the human factor, too. Recently I asked Sue Mosey, the longtime head of the nonprofit Midtown Detroit Inc., what the greater downtown still needed.

Her answer: More of everything.

Start with more groceries. Mosey said there is still room for another couple of groceries about the size of the Whole Foods store in Midtown to serve districts like New Center, East Jefferson, and Corktown.

"We also see a need for some nice New York-type bodegas serving locals who just want to walk over to pick up items," she told me.

Restaurants, bars, cafés, and even fitness centers are also increasingly popular and the greater downtown could use more of those, so long as they're carefully planned so as not to outpace demand.

"I also see some area for growth in certain sectors such as wineries, distilleries, food halls, etc., in the greater downtown," she added. Those are starting to come in but remaining an emerging sector in Detroit.

A place to work

And of course the greater downtown still needs more jobs, more office space, more housing. "A continued emphasis on new employment and residents must continue to be supported first and foremost," Mosey said.That downtown has come as far and as quickly as it has is remarkable, and for that we can thank many things. There was the city's successful emergence from bankruptcy, the new popularity of urban living among millennials, and efforts by Gilbert and the Ilitches to build their projects downtown.

Then, too, new forms of nonprofit governance for city-owned entities including Cobo Center, Eastern Market, Campus Martius Park, and the RiverWalk, all of which now operate through public authorities or conservancies, has made a huge difference.

And investment by everything from universities and hospitals to philanthropic foundations has boosted downtown's revival.

It has been great, the world is taking notice, and it ought to give us hope that Detroit really can come back from decades of decline.

But, even in downtown, nobody should think we're anywhere near done.

Contact John Gallagher: 313-222-5173 or gallagher@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @jgallagherfreep.