Urban Action 2012

redevelopment and rectify the slum areas of the city exacerbated by immigration and segregation. In conjunction with Detroit’s Master Plan, Five years of studies and research went into the neighborhood patterns of the city. In 1938

The Detroit Housing Commission presented a ten-year plan to reduce and reuse slum areas and to clear them out for better uses. The city embarked on this plan with private enterprise and developers to financially fund the redevelopment. (Ernecq) WWII put a damper on actions to move forward with any plans until 1946 when The Detroit Plan was announced. The Detroit Plan was focused on retaining residents in the city,many of whom “ After 1958, when were leaving as part of “white flight,” after the war and to put an end to urban blight. Industries also began leaving Detroit city proper and taking the first units were their workers with them as well. (Black) The city would take the financial completed, the burden on by itself financing it through higher returns of future taxes. In median rental price 1947 the Detroit Plan was passed and adopted. The Detroit Plan was still was 15 dollars per being implemented when the Federal Housing Act of 1949 would come into place, and fund two-thirds of the redevelopment area Detroit was month” working on, known as the Gratiot project. (Ernecq)

After a few political changes and concentration on industrial areas of the city, in 1950 Detroit was focused upon a 129-acre area in the eastern part of downtown called the Gratiot project, which was housing 7,000 people in an area nicknamed “Black Bottom”. The project took 14 years to come into completion, and it changed the entire neighborhood completely by razing the entire Black Bottom neighborhood and replacing it with several freeway junctions and modern high-rise living spaces geared toward the middle class. The Gratiot project marks the beginning and the end of redevelopment projects in Detroit over its 14-year lifespan. It is also the most studied and looked at urban renewal area of Detroit because of its massive breadth and importance to the central city. (Goodspeed)

A study conducted by Jonathon Staples of the University of Hawaii in 1970 analyzes twenty-two cities that instituted urban renewal policies and the impacts they had on populations. It should be noted that the twenty-two cities that responded to requests for information are the only cities included in his research evaluation. Through his research, Staples found that “only 18 percent of the substandard housing in the United States is found in cities with the population over 100,000.” (Staples 294) Most of which were populated by poor black and immigrant residents. Pair this with Detroit’s renewal plan and this proved to be extremely detrimental to the original residents of the Black Bottom because the neighborhood maintained a strong base of mostly Black renters. In 1950 there was 120 owner occupied units and seen in table 1, the Gratiot project had 1,119 units for rent in 1950 before demolition processes began. Renters were be evicted from their homes with no compensation, while owners received small portions of the actual value of their homes. (Goodspeed 52-62) As of 1960, although completion did not happen for four more years, there were only 337 units for rental. Eventually out of the 1,300 finished units, 400 would be available for rent. (Ernecq) The Gratiot project Black Bottom area in 1950 had a median monthly rental price of 28 dollars per month. After 1958, when the first units were completed, the median rental price was 15 dollars per month, the highest of all urban renewal projects across the country in Staple’s study. The resulting buildings of redevelopment are called the Lafayette Cooperative. Dominated by 28 | Urban action 2012