Can Detroit's Urban Revitalization Undo the Mistakes of Urban Renewal?

A proposal to redevelop the former Brewster-Douglass public housing site in Detroit raises a big question in a recent article by John Gallagher: "Is it really possible today to undo the damage that urban renewal policies of 50 years ago did to Detroit’s African-American community?"

According to Gallagher, the request for proposals released by the city for the Budweiser-Douglass project "boldly stated that a goal of the project was to 'repair the tear in the urban fabric' that the demolition of the historic Black Bottom and Paradise Valley neighborhoods created in the 1950s."

Gallagher speaks to a sample of academic researchers in the area of urban renewal, who all express skepticism that the project could achieve such lofty goals. "For one thing," explains Gallagher, "the new developments in the Brewster-Douglass site would house only about 1,500 new residents, compared with the 150,000 or so former black residents who once lived on Detroit's near lower east side but were forced to move due to the building of I-75 and other projects."

Gallagher also describes the project, which has since been awarded to Dan Gilbert's Bedrock Real Estate Services (along with two sites in Eastern market), as an example of upscale development investments coming to the downtown Detroit area. Gallagher surveyed the downtown development scene in a separate article from April.