Allan

Joel Landy has owned the Scott Mansion for years. He does good work, but the projects seem to take forever to get off the ground...just like everything else in this city. He has renovated many shells in the Cass Corridor into viable buildings, including a few that the city was hell-bent on tearing down. He was responsible for some of the renovation work on the same block (closer to Woodward). In fact, he was planning new construction in the area too, but I'd be surprised to see that get started before the renovation projects are complete. I was most excited to hear that the Book Mansion is getting renovated. It's not in the best shape anymore, since it's been abandoned for a few years and has been stripped out in the meantime. There have been a lot of problems with people stripping houses in Indian Village, especially within the last month.

Detroit's skyline from the Book Tower. Book Tower stands 38 stories (approximately 475 feet) tall and is the city's 9th tallest building. It provides one of the best skyline views in the city.

It was...but this is Detroit. It is virtually impossible for anything to go as planned here, especially with the economic situation now.

Not off the top of my head. Do you remember what year it was demolished?

Yep, look here: http://flickr.com/photos/allanm/sets/72157602215273128/ To even get access to the stadium required coordination with roughly 20 city departments, as well as about $7500 in fees waived. It was a big tangled mess, and I'm thankful to my friend for being so persistent in setting up our tour. It literally took about 3-4 months to coordinate everything. In retrospect, it might've been easier to just slip the guard $100. I do know some people that slipped in through a little-known opening, but it was an incredibly dangerous venture that involved a ladder. I'm not totally updated on the Tiger Stadium situation, but I do know that the dugout to dugout section won't be touched until August 1st to give the Tiger Stadium Conservancy a final chance to raise more money to save the stadium. The city hired someone to come in and take 6000 sepia photographs of the stadium. I am working on obtaining access to view those images.

I can't believe how bad the depot is getting. The depot is a special place to me. In fact, I have a mini shrine of sorts devoted to the building, including brass knobs, railing pieces, and part of the clock, all of which were taken out of the building in the mid-90s. I have not been to the depot in over two years now. I drive by it everyday on my way to work. It's so tempting, but I'd almost rather remember it the way that it was when I was last there. There is one photo I want to take on one of the upper floors, but to me it's not worth the 18 flights of stairs to the top. I took it once with 35mm film, but I accidentally scratched the negative, so it would be nice to have another shot at it. The last time I was in the depot, it was like a giant tourist trap. You'd swear that it was still open for business judging by the number of people I saw! There was a homeless man sitting on the mezzanine overlooking the waiting room and listening to some headphones, a group of 3 idiots dropping crap down the elevator shafts, a guy and his girlfriend wandering around (she was in sandals; he was barefoot), a photographer & a fashion model, several taggers, and a couple on the roof who were making out. The most amazing thing I saw, though, was when two cars with out of state plates stopped in front. All these people piled out of the cars, and then the next thing I know, these parents were helping their three 5-8 year old kids climb over the razor wire fence! The kids ran inside and were shocked to see us in the lobby taking photos. They said to me, "how did you guys get in here?" to which I replied, "not the same way you did." After about 5 minutes, their parents whistled for them to come out, and the kids climbed back over the fence. They all piled in the car and drove off...insane!!! My only reason for that visit was because I'd promised a friend I'd take him there. He remarked to me after we'd left that "when you said that we'd probably run into other people, I thought you meant one or two, not 25!" It was after that visit that I decided never to go again. To this day, I have not been back. Sometimes I wonder if I'll regret not going more often when they decide to demolish it, but I regret not photographing a lot of buildings.... There was once a large church I was photographing. There were ornate stained glass windows. I ran out of time, vowing to return to take detailed photos of each and every window in the sanctuary. Long story short, I didn't make it back for a couple months, and when I did, every window had been removed! It's always best to photograph things when you get the chance, because you might never see them again!

The city will eventually get around to razing Ford Auditorium. It sounds like the expanded Hart Plaza plan is still a few years off, so I'd expect Ford Auditorium to stick around a bit longer. There was an article about the Hart Plaza plan in the paper about it a few weeks ago, but it offered no new information from the article that was published when the project was first announced years ago. Ford Auditorium has no practical use whatsoever. Although I was in a class once where a student proposed turned it into a Walmart! I don't think they got a very good grade on that project!!

That's always been one of my favorite rowhouse buildings. It's hard to believe that it was abandoned just 5 years ago. One of my friends once lived there. The units were pretty nice inside, although the building was a total gut job, so there is nothing in the way of original details...just a modern open plan. I was looking at my photos from 2003 & 2004 the other day. It's amazing how far we've come in just 5 years, although we have a LONG way to go yet.

Yes, Slumpy is a freshly-graded dirt lot now. Is it just me, or has the city demolished a lot of houses lately? They demolished 2 on my block, and 2 one block over last weekend. This comes just weeks after they demolished 2 houses 3 blocks away. It's nice to actually receive some attention from the city for once.

Yes, that's one of the reasons why I haven't been....

I eat breakfast on the weekends at Honest John's. One of these days I do need to make it over to the Detroit Breakfast House....

Those of us who live here tend to call the whole of southwest Detroit "Mexicantown," though that is not technically correct. I find myself using it often to describe to suburbanites where I live, since most of them haven't got a clue. Historically speaking, my neighborhood was dubbed Claytown. Southwest Detroit, and particularly my area of Southwest, was where the brick companies set up shop and manufactured most of the bricks that built Detroit. This is still reflected today in the neighborhood, though mostly in the form of street names. Goldner, Greusel, Clippert, Lonyo...they were all brick companies. There were dozens of brick manufacturers, though most were gone by 1920, as the city expanded. The brickyards extended all the way into Dearborn. There are some interesting demographic shifts occurring in SW today. The Middle Eastern immigrants from Dearborn are tending to move east into Southwest Detroit. At the same time, the Hispanic population is moving northward as it expands. The Hispanic influence stretches north all the way to Warren Avenue in some places, although the highest concentrations of Hispanics are found south of the Ford Freeway. The area you refer to on W. Grand Blvd. is beautiful. A close friend of mine had the opportunity to buy one of those old Victorian mansions about 15 years ago for $12,000! He's wishing he'd done that right about now, haha. I don't know that the neighborhood really has a name, although I guess you could call it Hubbard Richard. Just west of there lies my favorite neighborhood in the city, Hubbard Farms. Back in the 1980s there was a movie that featured the neighborhood. If you can find it, it's worth seeing...you might try looking at some libraries. It's called "The Rosary Murders." You can catch glimpses of Duly's Coney Island, Holy Redeemer, one of the apartments on W. Grand Blvd. (the name escapes me, and a house on Hubbard Street in Hubbard Farms, among other places on the SW side.

The police rarely patrol the neighborhoods. I usually see a police car patroling in my neighborhood once every 2 weeks. And that's if you count driving the wrong way down my residential sidestreet the wrong way going 50mph as a "patrol." The police seem to have plenty of manpower to have 15+ unit speedtraps set up on Livernois every couple of weeks, though. I don't get it. I can't tell you where the police cars are, but they aren't here!