The New Republic has a great article on urban revitalization, and the lessons that Detroit could learn from cities like Belfast and Turin.

This is one of the few articles on Detroit that have done more than just bemoan the current state of affairs (a trait that I noticed in the TIME magazine cover-story, and greatly disappointed me) and offers actionable ideas.

Some frightening statistics from the article.

Even if Detroit were to rebuild its economy, it would still face a fundamental obstacle to recovery. It is just too big for itself, with a landscape that even locals compare to postwar Dresden. Nearly one-third of the land in the city is empty or unused, and some 80,000 city homes are vacant. ... Detroit has to change physically because it simply cannot sustain its current form. It was built for two million people, not the 900,000 that live there today. Manhattan, San Francisco, and Boston could all fit within Detroit’s 139-square-mile boundary, and there would still be 20 square miles to spare.

I always knew things were bad and that Detroit was weirdly laid out, but that really takes the taco.

The article places a lot of emphasis on what the Federal Gov't needs to do for the city, which I am personally in favor of. There's so many big things that need to happen there, and they seem beyond the ability of the residents or the state government.

The article ends with this statement, which I could not agree more with:

To allow Detroit to continue its march toward death would come at significant costs, both human and economic. For Detroit to die, especially in the face of such tested methods for saving cities, would be an American tragedy.