Grosse Pointe : In the News

In a good comeback story, Metro Detroit is no. 14 in the country in terms of percentage job growth from 2011 to 2012, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

More here.

Detroit's economy is facing forward. Now it just needs some new verbiage.

Excerpt:

"Former heavy manufacturing hubs around the Great Lakes like Pittsburgh, Detroit, Cleveland, and Milwaukee often get roped together under the heading of "post-industrial" (when, that is, we're not otherwise identifying them by their prevalence of rust). The term poses at least two problems, though: Industry still exists in many of these places, and the very notion of defining them by their relationship to the past can hamstring us from planning more thoughtfully for their future.

"You've got the 'post-war,' you've got 'post-modern,' you've got 'post-9/11,'" says Paul Kapp, an associate professor in the school of architecture at the University of Illinois and an editor of the book SynergiCity: Reinventing the Postindustrial City. He was speaking Sunday at the annual meeting of the American Planning Association (hosted in what's often considered the post-industrial city of Chicago). "You get to a point," Kapp says, "where you've got to say, 'When does post-something end and you do something new?' I think with 'post-industrial,' we're at that opportunity now. I think it's now time to come up with a new term."

More here.

A great, comprehensive article on how the 7.2-square-mile greater downtown Detroit is growing posher by the minute, it seems, and how and why its deindustrialized metros (and certain Detroit neighborhoods) are landing the creative class.

Excerpt:

"Two of the top 10 creative class tracts are in Birmingham; two are in Bloomfield Township, and another is in Bloomfield Hills, home to some of the priciest real estate in the U.S. and the Cranbrook educational community. Designed by Finnish architect  Eliel Saarinen, the architecture critic  Paul Goldberger  called Cranbrook "one of the greatest campuses ever created anywhere in the world." University of Michigan's  Little  points out in an email to me: "Cranbrook graduates have added to the cutting edge design and creative communities of Detroit and the nation for decades."

Another top creative class tract is in nearby Troy, a sprawling middle-class suburb with excellent public schools, and the site of a high-end mall, the Somerset Collection. Two are in Huntington Woods, a leafy neighborhood that boasts such notable amenities as the public golf course  Rackham and the Detroit Zoo. Two more are in the "Grosse Pointes" — Grosse Pointe Farms and Grosse Pointe Park — the communities of choice for many of Detroit's old industrial magnates, whose lakeshores are lined with sprawling Gilded Age mansions."

More here.

Last year Miley Cyrus (and Demi Moore and Marlo Thomas) Metro Detroit stood in for Chicago while shooting the movie LOL. The teen comedy's trailer is now live on the interwebs. Blink and you'll miss Grosse Pointe and Greektown. Though we love that Hollywood has discovered SE Michigan it'd sure be nice if movies shot in Detroit were set in Detroit?

Here's the trailer.

Listen. Watch. Wait for the goosebumps to subside.

Grosse Pointe's The Selected of God Choir does up Eminem's Lose Yourself.

Wow.

Proceeds from iTunes sales of the single will benefit local charities.


Watch the video below.

Sesame Street is now 40 years old. And, in honor of the great children's program, here is a shout-out to cooperation. A bill designed to allow the Detroit and Wayne County land banks to work together was announced with bipartisan support this week.

See, we do learn things from television.

Excerpt:

Bills that would allow land banks operated by Detroit and Wayne County to merge into a redevelopment entity with expanded powers were announced Monday, with bipartisan support.

The legislation would provide for a Detroit/Wayne County Redevelopment Authority that would "enable the city and county to have a cohesive strategy for stabilizing and redeveloping tax-reverted properties," said Sen. Tom George, R-Kalamazoo, in a news release.

Read the entire article here.

Though migration to the Mitten has slowed, mainly due to the auto industry crisis, families are still finding their way to Metro Detroit... and loving it. The Freep drops in in on a few to get their stories.

Excerpt:

Outland grew up in Grosse Pointe, where her parents still live. Last September, the couple moved to Michigan so their two girls, ages 5 and 10, could start school. They rented an apartment while they searched for a house.

They ended up finding a three-bedroom, 2 1/2 -bath brick colonial in Grosse Pointe Park for $260,000 this spring. And it is just down the street from Outland's parents' home.

Outland said pricing was one of the appeals of the move back.

"Even in St. Louis, the housing market had slowed down, but houses cost more there," she said. "Another reason we wanted to move here was I knew Michigan and Detroit were going through a bad time. It was my chance to contribute to the community."

Read the entire article here.

Whether you like Dearborn's Miller's Bar or Royal Oak's Red Coat Tavern, you favorite burger joint is bound to show up somewhere on the Freep's list of best burgers in town. Not into red meat? Don't worry, check out No. 24. Ferndale's Flytrap has a salmon burger just waiting for consumption.

Excerpt:

When we asked readers this fall to point us toward Detroit's best hamburgers, hundreds of you sent recommendations. We read every one, picked the places that sounded best and then hit the streets in Wayne, Oakland and Macomb counties to taste them. Six weeks and innumerable antacids later, here are our favorites.

Read the entire article here.

As they wont to do each year, the Metro Times has released its annual "Best of Detroit" awards.

Check them out here.

Wayne County's TURBO (Transforming Underdeveloped Residential & Business Opportunities) program is jump-starting developments all over Wayne County.

Excerpt:

TURBO is a program of the Wayne County Land Bank that gives cash reimbursements to property owners making significant real estate investments in the county.

Developers may get a 100 percent tax rebate for the first year of construction and an amount equal to 50 percent of their taxes in cash rebates over the next five years for new construction or total rehabilitation projects. Partial rehabilitation and projects involving brownfield development can also get cash rebates under the program.

TURBO incentives have been used to jump-start several developments, creating about 700 permanent and construction jobs, Ficano said. These include retail projects in Highland Park and Detroit, an envelope factory in Van Buren Township, a bank in Grosse Pointe Woods and a food-service plant in Canton Township.

TURBO officials are negotiating incentives for projects planned in Livonia, Melvindale, Garden City, Redford Township, Taylor, Canton Township, Detroit, Grosse Pointe and Plymouth. Investment is expected to top $100 million by the end of the year. Ficano said the program helps attract new business as well as improving existing businesses.

Read the entire article here.

The Metrotimes annual restaurant guide runs the gamut: from coneys to caviar, from haute to simply hot.

Categories include eggs, buffets, steaks and vegetarian-friendly. Check it out here.

Thursday, June 21 is the second annual "Dump the Pump" day that calls for the parking of cars and the riding of public transit as a way of calling attention to the environmental and economic benefits of using public transit.

A transit fact:

From 1995 through 2006, public transportation ridership increased by 30 percent, a growth rate higher than the 12 percent increase in US population and higher than the 24 percent growth in use of the nation's highways over the same period.

Find out more here.

The Michigan Suburbs Alliance next Mayors & Managers breakfast will focus on healthcare legacy costs. It is set for June 29 and will be held at Macomb Community College.

Find out more and register here.

AT&T has announced an IP-based TV, voice and data service to launch in the Detroit area, the first of its kind.

Excerpt:

"It's an IP network for the home, and on that IP network wlll be a variety of applications, one of which is television," said Jennifer Jones, AT&T vice president and general manager for Michigan.

Jones also assured GLITR that the service will provide local cable access channels to schools and communities -- although those schools and communities must take the initiative to send their content to AT&T for display on TV channels.

Read the entire article here.