  Bvos Member Username: Bvos Post Number: 2201 Registered: 10-2003 |
Here's an interesting article from Forbes Magazine. They say Detroit may be a ghost city by 2100: http://www.forbes.com/2007/06/ 11/ghost-cities-future-biz-cx_ 21cities_ee_0611ghostcities.ht ml | ||
Tuere Member Username: Tuere Post Number: 19 Registered: 11-2003 |
Kind of interesting they chose such a nice pic of Detroit's skyline for the article. You would think they'd want to show abandoned skyscrapers or neighborhoods to go along with the article's theme. | ||
Rb336 Member Username: Rb336 Post Number: 265 Registered: 02-2007 |
Detroit, Venice, Naples, San Francisco | ||
Professorscott Member Username: Professorscott Post Number: 486 Registered: 12-2006 |
Interesting. Here is a paragraph from that article (which was not about Detroit; we just got a big mention) with my comments. "Whether these cities disappear entirely, of course, is an open question. Detroit's population has fallen by around a third since 1950..." Nope, much more than that. "...and now equals about 950,000." Nope, less. We argued it in this blog and came up with low to mid 800s as a likely figure in 2007. "It is expected to shrink slowly but steadily until at least 2030; unemployment inside the city is more than 10%. (The suburbs around Detroit, meanwhile, are growing.)" Well, some of them. "If trends hold, Detroit will be altered beyond recognition by 2100." If you took someone who had last seen Detroit in (say) 1960, and brought them back today, my guess is they would claim it is already altered beyond recognition. Thanks for the post! Interesting article. | ||
Iheartthed Member Username: Iheartthed Post Number: 1033 Registered: 04-2006 |
I wonder why they didn't mention New York as being threatened by natural disaster? There has been talk that global warming or a hurricane could flood out Manhattan. | ||
Hans57 Member Username: Hans57 Post Number: 173 Registered: 05-2006 |
Tsunami most likely for New York. | ||
Professorscott Member Username: Professorscott Post Number: 487 Registered: 12-2006 |
Remember, New York City takes up five entire counties. It is kind of hard to imagine that huge chunks of that could be wiped out by one natural disaster unless it was a real doozy. Imagine one event wiping out, say, Wayne, Oakland, Macomb, Washtenaw and Monroe Counties, and you'll have some sense of what I'm saying. | ||
Danny Member Username: Danny Post Number: 6107 Registered: 02-2004 |
Forbes is just playing with himself with his reports. Detroit will NOT be a ghost city by 2100. By 2100 Detroit's population would rebound about to 900,000 by then. It won't be black folks who would play a dominate role in Detroit. New Jobs, businesses, gentrification and rising property values will gobbled up the ghettos making room for new neighborhoods filled with hip cool skinny white kids and other ethnic diverse race. It would close as Seattle, Boston and Atlanta combined. | ||
Thejesus Member Username: Thejesus Post Number: 1475 Registered: 06-2006 |
we already are a ghost city in a sense... already urban explorers are examining our city's "ruins", trying to piece together what life must have been life back during the city's peak, much like people examine what's left of ancient Egypt or Rome... | ||
Cman710 Member Username: Cman710 Post Number: 318 Registered: 07-2006 |
I am not sure a tsunami is the most likely risk for New York. Tsunami's are caused by earthquakes, and to the best of my knowledge, there are no huge earthquakes that even rarely occur anywhere near enough to cause a problem. I could be wrong, but would like to see more evidence. A really awful hurricane or rising ocean levels could badly impact Manhattan, most of which is at or near sea level. (The island was not actually as flat before it was settled, but was made flat over time as development progressed). | ||
Jt1 Member Username: Jt1 Post Number: 9453 Registered: 10-2003 |
I plan on leaving the city by 2100. | ||
Jimaz Member Username: Jimaz Post Number: 2438 Registered: 12-2005 |
quote:Possibly from a volcano on La Palma in the Canary Islands, although there is some dispute about it. | ||
Zephyrprocess Member Username: Zephyrprocess Post Number: 421 Registered: 08-2006 |
quote: I'm sorry, but that's just silly. NYC is somewhere between 300-325 square miles. That's more than double the area of the City of Detroit (~140), but only half of Wayne County. --Zephyr("I'm crossing the county line to avoid the tornado warning")process | ||
Cmyk Member Username: Cmyk Post Number: 4 Registered: 06-2007 |
I'm with Jt1. I will have at least retired to Naples by then. | ||
Lilpup Member Username: Lilpup Post Number: 2373 Registered: 06-2004 |
last large city located on a major waterway to become a ghost town is...? | ||
Iheartthed Member Username: Iheartthed Post Number: 1034 Registered: 04-2006 |
^New Orleans... | ||
Professorscott Member Username: Professorscott Post Number: 488 Registered: 12-2006 |
OK, Zeph, I'll plead guilty to silly, but still: imagine a 300+ square mile area being wiped by a single natural disaster. When that area isn't below sea level to start with. | ||
Gistok Member Username: Gistok Post Number: 4668 Registered: 08-2004 |
I doubt that a Tsunami would damage much more than the southeastern coast of Staten Island, and the south coasts of Brooklyn and Jamaica Bay in Queens. Manhattan is protected by New York Harbor and the Verrazzano Narrows, and it is doubtful that a Tsunami would be coming up and into Long Island Sound to wreck havoc on the Bronx, and northern Manhattan, Brooklyn & Queens. Maybe some big waves would come in from the south and east, but hardly the killer waves that a normal Tsunamis packs. Of course if a super Tsunami were to originate from a huge landslide of the Los Palma Volcano in the Canary Islands (as Jimaz mentioned) generating 200 foot waves... then all bets are off. | ||
Cman710 Member Username: Cman710 Post Number: 321 Registered: 07-2006 |
I am from the southeast part of Staten Island, so I hope not! Actually, where I am from on the southeast part of the island is not by the coast. Where I am is quite a bit elevated. But there are some areas right on the coast that have some flooding problems hat would clearly be affected. Still, a tsunami hitting the NYC area remains very, very unlikely. | ||
Alan55 Member Username: Alan55 Post Number: 296 Registered: 09-2005 |
The problem with forecasts such as this, besides coming from a questionable source like Forbes, is that they are all-straight line predictions. They make no allowance for dramatic changes in politics, economics, or social behavior. In 1900, Las Vegas had a population of 26. Extrapolating from 1900, it would seem logical that Las Vegas would have about 150 people in 2000. Instead, due to the gaming explosion of the 1950s and 60s, it has several million. It would be more helpful if these magazines concentrated on what will happen in the next 10 or 15 years, rather than the next 90. | ||
Elsuperbob Member Username: Elsuperbob Post Number: 4 Registered: 03-2007 |
The list is as silly as most other Forbes lists. San Francisco made a ghost town because of an earthquake? Naples because of a volcanic eruption? Both have been through them and both of them have become larger and greater cities since. And Detroit isn't the first city in history to go through economic disasters and population flight. And like those others (Rome and Constantinople both fell to populations of about 50,000) it can rebound. A planner I met in Reykjavik a couple weeks ago, Trausti Valsson, believes global warming will eventually force people out of the south, to the coasts and then back inland to the upper midwest. Especially by the end of the century as Canada's heartland warms and the Northwest Passage opens up he believes this area will be a major center of economic activity. And perhaps Detroit, on the border as it is, would be right in the middle of it all. That book can be seen at his website, http://hi.is/~tv/. I think it's in chapter 4, page 92 or around there in "How the World Will Change" | ||
Hans57 Member Username: Hans57 Post Number: 174 Registered: 05-2006 |
By 2100 all of the Great Lakes Megalopolis will have merged to form one super suburb. Cleveland, Detroit, Indianapolis and Chicago will be an indiscernible mess. Detroit existing as a separate municipality is another question though. | ||
Burnsie Member Username: Burnsie Post Number: 1052 Registered: 11-2003 |
Alan55 wrote of Las Vegas, "it has several million." Actually, the 2005 Census estimate was 575,973. At the rate it's growing, it may be closer to 650,000 by now. The whole metropolitan area (Clark County) had about 1.8 million people in 2005. | ||
Supersport Member Username: Supersport Post Number: 11615 Registered: 10-2003 |
Predicting what a city/population will be 100 years from now is about as accurate as a 10 day weather forecast. | ||
Patrick Member Username: Patrick Post Number: 4597 Registered: 10-2003 |
I wonder if the majority of housing stock will remain standing in 100 years. Look at the thousands of poorly built WW2 era homes that are now starting to show their age. | ||
Bulletmagnet Member Username: Bulletmagnet Post Number: 712 Registered: 01-2007 |
I find it interesting when it comes to Detroit they show a picture of the downtown skyline. Why don't they use some photos such as mine, to illustrate the vast expanding prairies within the city's boundaries? http://farm1.static.flickr.com /147/408299321_4069aa53fd_b.jp g http://farm1.static.flickr.com /159/428514085_183c95d148_b.jp g http://farm1.static.flickr.com /207/444133303_24805e211b_b.jp g http://farm1.static.flickr.com /226/448793589_6bec3c3cf6_b.jp g If the world floods because my F-150 earth killer melts the polar ice caps, it'll be cool to dock my F-150 runabout at the top floor of the Renaissance Center. | ||
Rms Member Username: Rms Post Number: 52 Registered: 11-2005 |
There were two smallish (2.4 & 2.6) earthquakes in Manhattan as recent as 2001. Here's an excerpt from a TLC program on large cities at risk for a natural disaster. I had read separately of scientists who are concerned that within the next 100 years NYC is statistically likely to have a much stronger earthquake. I think these geologic facts are way off of people's radar regarding NY. "Manhattan Island is crisscrossed by earthquake faults, and twice in its history — 1737 and 1884 the nation's biggest city has been jolted by relatively mild quakes in the 5.0 range. Whenever the next one strikes, scientists worry that it could be far bigger. Much of Manhattan sits on a deep layer of soft, post-Ice Age sediment over extremely hard rock, a juxtaposition of geological extremes that bodes ominously. A 6.0 quake could shake the city's buildings with nearly the intensity of the 6.8 quake in Kobe. Inexplicably, the city dragged its feet about adding earthquake-mitigating requirements to its building codes until the mid-1990s. The generally well-designed towers in the Manhattan's skyline most likely would survive a 6.0, but the unreinforced masonry townhouses where most residents live might not fare so well. A 1989 study estimated that a quake would cause more than 130 simultaneous blazes, which could...." | ||
Detroitbill Member Username: Detroitbill Post Number: 268 Registered: 09-2006 |
A unusual prediction. Anyone visiting in the mid 1980s downtown and coming back today say the city downtown at least looks much better.. No one can predict the future mind you but its most likely a city on a major waterway with international positioning will become a ghost town. Its way to strategically located. The most interesting thing left out is we are located in one of the most resource rich areas in the country. When the rest of the country goes dry we won't be in the same position. Clearly, people will not run away from resource rich areas, they may redefine themselves ,but ,actually most cities do in a 100 year time frame. | ||
Michigan Member Username: Michigan Post Number: 632 Registered: 04-2007 |
This ruined my high from the Crain's article | ||
Sumotect Member Username: Sumotect Post Number: 274 Registered: 08-2004 |
Global warming will have a big negative effect on coastal cities. Detroit and the rest of the upper Midwest should be poised to take advantage of it. Detroit is strategically located being at the center of one huge international megalopolis. It is already a huge trading port. At some point in the very near future the lower property values will be noticed by investors. Of course the global thirst for fresh water will make Michigan seem like the garden of eden. All this area needs is leadership. |
