Downtown Detroit's Bright Future

Though the hometown team lost the recent World Series, the event highlighted the progress that downtown Detroit has made attracting new businesses, residents and stores. More and more urban experts are starting to agree with the city's Mayor, Kwame Kilpatrick, about the arrival of a downtown renaissance, though most point out several major obstacles that remain in the way of a vibrant downtown.

"[Yet these] positive trends mean even the most optimistic visions for downtown Detroit no longer sound so far-fetched. Talking about downtown's future during the World Series, Kilpatrick vowed to make even the derelict Capitol Park district west of Woodward into a Greenwich Village-style enclave of lofts and shopping."

"A study released last week at the annual University of Michigan-Urban Land Institute Real Estate Forum in Detroit found that the new downtown residents are younger, better educated and wealthier than expected, with average household incomes of close to $60,000 a year."