Discuss Detroit » DISCUSS DETROIT! » Slate.com photo essay on "fabulous ruins" y witold rybcznski « Previous Next »
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Clermont
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Username: Clermont

Post Number: 50
Registered: 09-2007
Posted on Wednesday, March 18, 2009 - 3:03 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

http://www.slate.com/id/221369 6/slideshow/2213979/fs/0//entr y/2213980/

for detroiters more along the lines of dog bites man than vice versa but still of interest

and it links to this site
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Gsgeorge
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Username: Gsgeorge

Post Number: 766
Registered: 08-2006
Posted on Wednesday, March 18, 2009 - 3:11 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

not my photo, i just compiled them for the wiki a few years ago.... credits to whomever took the photos.

(Message edited by gsgeorge on March 19, 2009)
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Cman710
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Username: Cman710

Post Number: 609
Registered: 07-2006
Posted on Wednesday, March 18, 2009 - 3:31 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Gsgeorge, did you notice they used several of your pictures from wikipedia?
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Fnemecek
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Username: Fnemecek

Post Number: 1973
Registered: 12-2004
Posted on Wednesday, March 18, 2009 - 3:39 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Jesus Christ!

Okay - I get deal with the obsession that some folks have with all of our vacant buildings. I get that. We have lots of them and every wanna be photographer loves shooting them.

This part annoys the crap out of me:
quote:

Not exactly a hotbed of the creative class (which prefers warm climates, anyway) but something.


And it was written by someone from Slate.com, which is based in New York.

I swear to God, one of these days I am going to start stapling maps to the foreheads of every New Yorker. The maps will be printed backwards, of course, so they can be be read while looking into a mirror.

It will likely be the first time any of these people have ever looked at a map. Otherwise, they would have noticed a few things like:

#1. New York is a northern state.

#2. New York has a northern climate.

#3. New York is far, far away from the tropics; almost as far as Detroit is.

The average winter temperature in Detroit is whopping 4 degrees colder than NYC. This also explains things like why it is that there's ice skating in Rockefeller Center during the winter; not surfing.

*sigh*

I can deal with pretentious "art" students. They eventually grow up. People this stupid, however, should not be allowed out of their own homes.
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Cloud_wall
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Username: Cloud_wall

Post Number: 39
Registered: 02-2009
Posted on Wednesday, March 18, 2009 - 4:02 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

I'm glad fuggy Jacoby's got a shout out. I love that place.

Every time these stories appear, they get posted. And then people bitch about how no one ever says anything positive about Detroit, what's so fascinating about ruins, etc. Then someone mixes in a few occupied buildings, and of course that's something to snarkily pick on too.

This was not an unfair portrait and the fact that it covered buildings that are alive and well is a good thing.

As to the weather comment, I'm not sure it merits the author's house arrest, as proposed. Sounded to me like he was trying to cut us a break. We aren't New York. So without that cache it's a little harder to attract creative folks without some other good draw, like the weather. That seems fair.

I'm glad the guy visited, showed interest, and gave us credit for being down but not out.
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Kahnman
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Username: Kahnman

Post Number: 70
Registered: 02-2006
Posted on Wednesday, March 18, 2009 - 4:22 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

I'm surprised we don't get more UFO sightings around the "weird sci-fi outer-galactic space colony" Ren-cen than we already do...

cut to fuggy, Randy "The Ram" Robinson wandering through the Warsaw Ghetto (aka Brush Park)- fade to black...
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3rdworldcity
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Username: 3rdworldcity

Post Number: 1362
Registered: 01-2005
Posted on Wednesday, March 18, 2009 - 4:27 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Lame is correct. Neither the photography nor the commentary are as professional as Lowell's or Camilo Vergara's.
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Iseries840
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Username: Iseries840

Post Number: 1032
Registered: 08-2005
Posted on Wednesday, March 18, 2009 - 4:38 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

"since all the office workers live in the suburbs"

What a load of crap!
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Fnemecek
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Username: Fnemecek

Post Number: 1974
Registered: 12-2004
Posted on Wednesday, March 18, 2009 - 5:27 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

quote:

s to the weather comment, I'm not sure it merits the author's house arrest, as proposed. Sounded to me like he was trying to cut us a break. We aren't New York. So without that cache it's a little harder to attract creative folks without some other good draw, like the weather. That seems fair.


Bah!

Detroit has the same weather as Boston, Chicago, New York, Toronto and bunch of other cities that are generally considered to be creative hubs. Meanwhile, places like Biloxi, Mississippi and many spots in Texas are doing worse than Detroit economically in spite of the fact that they have a much warming climate.

Anyone who blames Detroit's problems on the weather is simply an idiot.
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Cman710
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Username: Cman710

Post Number: 610
Registered: 07-2006
Posted on Wednesday, March 18, 2009 - 5:58 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Having lived in New York and Boston, I can say that the weather in Boston is considerably worse. While the difference may only be about 5 degrees in air temperature, that can frequently make a huge difference in the amount of snowfall. Also, in Manhattan, the ground is warmer than average so it takes more for snow to stick there than elsewhere.

That's not to say that I do not agree with you. I do think that claiming that the creative class demands particularly weather is not very convincing. I would like to see evidence that weather has played a significant role in the migration of the creative class.
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Lowell
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Username: Lowell

Post Number: 2253
Registered: 09-2003
Posted on Wednesday, March 18, 2009 - 7:16 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

And he lifted the picture of the Michigan Theater lobby from my Fabulous Ruins of Detroit Tour and then tagged it as, "Images licensed under GNU Free Documentation, Version 1.2.?"

To whom do I send the invoice? Slate? LOL
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Stosh
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Username: Stosh

Post Number: 175
Registered: 01-2009
Posted on Wednesday, March 18, 2009 - 7:42 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Read farther down on this page for how it got there in the first place.
quote:

(The lobby of the Michigan Theater in Detroit, Michigan as it appeared in 1927, left, and as it appears now, right. 1927 photo from [http://www.detnews.com]. Present-day photo from [http://www.detroityes.com].



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F ile:MichiganTheaterlobbyDetroi t.jpg
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Cloud_wall
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Username: Cloud_wall

Post Number: 43
Registered: 02-2009
Posted on Wednesday, March 18, 2009 - 10:47 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

On the weather topic, my main point was that it isn't a big deal. It isn't as though a misconception about people's love of warm weather has sunk our plans to attract creative types.

Anecdotally, I've seen a lot of classmates and friends go off to awful, featureless towns in California and Florida. Arguably, they wouldn't go to the same type of community in Ohio or Vermont. And you should see all the hipster transplants in that mecca of culture, Orlando. And who can explain any other (or any) appeal of Phoenix? Not me.

A lot have also gone to Chicago, NY, SF, Seattle, or abroad, too. But enough go to hot wastelands to make you wonder.

My feeling is that people on the move want opportunity to succeed, like-minded neighbors, culture, and a chance to get laid. The list goes on, I'm sure. Weather is down on that list, I agree. But it's a factor. When the author of the Slate slideshow mentioned it, I don't think he was perpetuating some damaging, widely held belief, he was just giving us a pass. It was benignly ignorant, at worst.

So this is a long way of saying I agree, but what makes you feel so strongly about the issue?

(Message edited by Cloud_wall on March 18, 2009)
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Eastsideal
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Username: Eastsideal

Post Number: 419
Registered: 10-2007
Posted on Wednesday, March 18, 2009 - 11:42 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

What a totally lame-ass effort. Really bad ill-researched off the top of the author's head stuff combined with the products of a few minutes of Googling. Complete with swiped pictures too.
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Rhymeswithrawk
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Username: Rhymeswithrawk

Post Number: 1817
Registered: 11-2005
Posted on Wednesday, March 18, 2009 - 11:59 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

I agree, Eastside. There was absolutely nothing here worth even mentioning. This guy is supposed to be an expert on architecture (has written books, etc.) yet any middle school kid could tell me what he told me. Go ahead and point out our abandoned buildings, but don't be so boring about it. He trumpets our architecture, then says nothing about it other than we have - wait for it, wait for it - abandoned buildings.
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Ocean2026
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Username: Ocean2026

Post Number: 163
Registered: 11-2008
Posted on Thursday, March 19, 2009 - 12:45 am:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

The thing that struck me is the end "Detroit is not disappearing soon with its 1.03 million residents"

I guess I had assumed that this was something new but its about 200,000 residents ago.

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