DETROIT (AP) — The families of Detroit’s Brightmoor area are delighted that the day is finally approaching when bulldozers will arrive to level more of their neighborhood. After that, their community’s future will be like the cleared landscape — a blank canvas.
For years, Brightmoor residents pleaded with the city to demolish vacant homes that scavengers had stripped of wiring and plumbing and anything of value. Some structures are already gone, and now officials aim to do much more, possibly tearing down as many as 450 empty houses each week across more than 20 square miles of this bankrupt city — a vast patchwork of rotting homes comparable to the size of Manhattan.
The huge demolition project holds the potential to transform large parts of Detroit into an urban-redevelopment laboratory like the nation has never seen. But community leaders here and in cities that have attempted similar transformations say Detroit’s best efforts could still wither from lack of money, lack of commitment or harsh economic realities.