“It's buzzing here”: Detroit’s revival takes shape after decades of decay

30 miles West in Ann Arbor, there are tech gigs but not tons of them. If you are apart of the University of Michigan, there are tons of opportunities via the college and the groups there, but if not there aren't tons of openings.

Detroit itself is an amazing city, but it isn't a tech hub, nor is it for everyone. It is the shell of the automotive companies that started to move their operations of out the country in the 50s-70s. Check out the book "Origins of the Urban Crisis" to get an understanding of the decay in Detroit and other large cities who the Big 3 have abandoned for a profit.

All of my friends that I have brought to the D are always weirded out by how big the city is, yet how few people you actually see outside of the entertainment district. The streets and sidewalks can be fully empty, with a 6 lane road that has so many holes that it is more pothole than road now.

This piece is nothing but an advertisement for Dan Gilbert.

As a native (suburban) Detroiter (who departed 20 years ago), I don’t want to throw shade but articles like these rarely give a good sense of the size or scope of decades of decay. There are still miles (and miles) of apocalyptic looking neighborhoods. As a teenager, we had our pick of hundreds of abandoned warehouses to party (“rave”).

I'd love to see it flourish, and maybe if the area could get past its car addiction, I’d even want to call it home again one day.

*Removed inaccurate statement about the city’s size.

I really thought the major "rust belt" cities were going to blow up after the big COVID WFH push. Why spend 2-10x as much to live in one of four coastal metros when you could get the same pay while living somewhere much cheaper. The biggest issue with these cities in the last 50 years has been a lack of high paying jobs and WFH tech jobs essentially negate that issue.

There are a ton of American cities that have fallen from their former glory but are full of cheap housing, interesting things, and lots of history.

Shame it doesn't seem like that has panned out much.

In my experience, companies based in Michigan pay 20-50k lower and do not have staff/principal roles available. You have to find a remote role to stay competitive wage wise. Some companies are not willing to pay as much for Michigan workers as they are NY/SF/elsewhere workers, too.

I think the reality is Columbus and Chicago are growing quicker than Detroit. The relative increase here might be "buzzing" but in absolute terms, it's desolate.

I live in the greater Detroit area and would love for it to become a thriving tech community. While articles like this portray a thriving tech scene here, it’s not entirely accurate. Many automotive companies claim a need for tech talent but establish labs and locations in the Bay Area. For instance, Rivian’s vehicle software isn’t developed in Michigan, despite being HQed here.

The prominent tech employers in our area are Rocket, United Wholesale Mortgage, and GM. I believe our tech talent lacks the competitiveness of other tech hubs. I hope the state of Michigan can take proactive steps to enhance the appeal of our state and Detroit as desirable tech locations, but we must acknowledge that we are not yet a thriving tech hub.

Detroit is buzzing because it’s gone through a complete and total deflation. Things are up because they went so far down, not unlike say… Argentina today or the rest of the US in 3-5 years.

I left Michigan about 3 years ago after living around Detroit for 7 years. Tech jobs there are primarily with the Big 3, and the cult known as Rocket. There are places like Ann Arbor, but again, the opportunities are limited.

As for Detroit itself, I feel like I've seen this headline every year for the past decade. I'm not saying that Detroit hasn't made progress (it absolutely has, go visit the refurbished train station), but compared to other cities it's still lagging.

I wonder how the tariffs will affect this given how integrated Windsor is into Detroit's auto manufacturers.

I guess my question is, are all these startups going to Detroit because of the positive vibes, or are they actually getting compelling direct subsidies / credits / etc from the government?

(Not that there is anything wrong with giving or taking subsidies necessarily, but that might paint a more accurate picture of the incentives in place)

There is some truth to this, but i worry detroit is just doing the same thing that blew them out last time (overdependence on a small group of extremely rich businessmen that can leave at any time). Hope this works out for them, Detroit has really suffered since the automakers left (and the riots)

all the apocalyptic stories about Detroit’s decay after the ‘08 collapse and one thing that stuck with me was that there were serious discussion about razing entire empty neighborhoods to deal with the fact the city was a lot smaller than it used to be.

In my area, there are a lot of communities that have also gone through decades of contraction and are now sparsely populated with a lot of dilapidated structures. It’s depressing and requires keeping around a lot of infrastructure that these areas can’t afford to support.

I’m torn between thinking a) we should raze these unusable buildings, tear out some roads, eventually revert to nature OR b) start a massive reinvestment program to give stuff away and bring in some new blood to revitalize.

Spoiler: it’s probably not