Detroit hoping for Super lift

  • By John Sleeper / Herald columnist
  • Monday, January 30, 2006 9:00pm
  • Sports

DETROIT – His name is Arthur. That’s what he said, anyway.

He wears a black stocking cap beginning to decay on the sides. Around his skinny body is a black, tattered down jacket with the collar up. A black scarf winds around his neck and touches his gray whiskers. His black jeans are torn at the hems and his off-white, canvas tennis shoes have holes in them.

But I’ll most remember the eyes. I wondered how he could see, his eyes were so cloudy from cataracts.

“Been dat way fo’ while,” Arthur says. “You do wid what you got. No sense cryin.’”

He sleeps wherever he can find shelter. An abandoned building. A tram station. Anywhere. He looks 60, but says he’s 38. I can’t be sure. Clearly, he shows the toll of a desperately cruel life.

“You here fo’ da Supuh Bo’?” he asks me. Yes, I say.

“Dey doin’ dere best to clean it all up,” he says, his arm waving at the surroundings. Then he laughs.

“Ain’t got enough soap, though.” He laughs again.

“Got a dollah, man? Brothuh’s gotta eat.”

I gave Arthur a few bucks and wished him well.

Arthur was right, of course. Amongst the skyscrapers, world-class museums, theaters, galleries and sparkling sporting venues are the abandoned buildings, unconscionable poverty and an unshakably dark, hopeless feeling.

The stats don’t lie. In its economic heyday spurred on by a booming auto industry in the 1950s, Detroit’s population was 1.8 million. It now numbers less than 900,000.

Last week, Ford, based in suburban Dearborn, Mich., announced planned layoffs of 25,000 across the county. General Motors says it lost $8.6 billion last year. Detroit’s unemployment rate is 6.8 percent, second-highest among big cities, trailing only New Orleans. Nearly 1,400 city workers have been laid off since June.

More than a third of Detroit’s residents live at or below the poverty line.

Taking the shuttle in from Detroit Wayne County airport, we passed Tiger Stadium, where the Tigers played from 1912 until they moved in 1999 to Comerica Park. It stands unused and, judging from its ghostly, rust-stained whitish hue, unloved.

“It really should come down,” my chaperone says. “It’s just there, not doing anything.”

Tiger Stadium is not the only empty shell in the area. Estimates are that 40,000 city-owed properties are available. Officials hope the Super Bowl will bring buyers and reduce that number.

More than a third of Detroit’s residents live at or below the poverty line.

With poverty comes crime. Consistently, Detroit ranks among the top five in big-city murder rates. It was second in 2004 to New Orleans. In 2002, it was second to Washington, D.C.

It is hoped that the Super Bowl can help, along with recent city investments of more than $100 million in its downtown businesses, street improvements and apartments. The estimates are that Super Bowl visitors, around 100,000, will spend as much as $180 million. City literature estimates that the total economic impact could pass $300 million.

Then there’s the free publicity that 3,000 journalists expected to filter through this week will provide.

“We want to redeem ourselves and re-introduce ourselves as the New Detroit,” Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick said.

Certainly, the city is trying to put its best foot forward. Downtown, Super Bowl banners hang from lampposts and buildings. Every other store announces itself as “Your Official Outlet for Super Bowl Merchandise.” Woodward Avenue, formerly home of empty, boarded-up restaurants, offices and storefronts, is closed off for the week. For a mile, display tents pop up, along with equipment from the “Motown Winter Blast,” which will have everything from dog-sledding to a skating rink to ice sculptures, starting Thursday.

Hip clubs, fine restaurants, urban lofts and luxury condos have moved into downtown. The area has new streetlights and newly paved sidewalks.

The Chamber of Commerce wants you to know that Detroit is transforming itself into a key destination to work, play and live. It wants to combine its rich history (founded in 1701 as a French trading post and later evolved into the city that put the world on wheels) with a bright future brought on by increased investment.

It’s an all-out effort to display Detroit in the most positive light possible. One aim is to get sports fans to come back in 2009 for the men’s basketball Final Four. If they get lucky, they may attract business owners who want to open factories or offices in the Metro area.

“It’s gonna come back,” said Nate Smith, working as a security guard for Super Bowl week. “You watch. You can already see it.”

Give the city credit. It’s trying. Comerica Park and neighboring Ford Field are venues as spectacular as any in the country. On the eastern edge of downtown is Greektown, once just a row of Greek restaurants, now the center of Detroit nightlife, with eateries, bistros and clubs.

Most of the downtown sites are linked by The People Mover elevated train system, which carves a 2.9-mile curvilinear path through the central business district with 13 stops.

While the $3 billion in major project investments in the past five years can’t cover all of Detroit’s scars, it does show a commitment to turn things around.

It will take more than a little time.

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