ralph wrote:Nice Squirrel Beachbum, as is the photo of the Detroit skyline, but 'Not looking like the 'hell-hole it really is', leaves me wanting to know more. You obviously know the place, care to tell us a little about it? I always find that sort of thing interesting.
Detroit used to be the automotive capital of the world, but sadly it has fallen on hard times.
With the decline of the domestic auto industry, many of the people who had good paying jobs were forced to abandon nice homes when they could no longer pay the mortgage.
In some areas, in every street, almost a third of the houses have been abandoned, have fallen into serious disrepair and are often used by the homeless and d*ug users as crash pads.
I read somewhere that the average house price in Detroit is $10,000.00 which would buy you a half decent used car and still nobody wants to buy them because the city is flat broke.
Street lighting and road repairs are almost non existent and stuff you would normally expect like garbage pickup and snow removal are spotty.
The previous mayor is recently out of prison for graft related offences and has just been further convicted of serious additional Federal charges including Racketeering for which he is to be sentenced soon.
Reports say about a third of the population is functionally illiterate.
Most years Detroit and New Orleans are in competition as murder capital USA.
I watch the Detroit TV news most days and there is rarely a day where they aren’t reporting a shooting or armed robberies.
I was going through Detroit a few years ago and took a wrong turn and ended up on one of the worst streets, which went on for miles. As a honky in a nice car, I had to be very careful to time the traffic lights so that I hit them all on green.
Yes Ugly Betty said she was from Detroit, but I’m guessing she lived somewhere north of Nine Mile Road which is the dividing point at which things get much better.