NPR gives the real Detroit some air

In this piece on NPR, a man from the burbs finds an artisanal Detroit.

Excerpt:

"The corrupt, crime-addled Detroit of Charlie LeDuff's new memoir, Detroit: An American Autopsy, isn't the same city that I left a month ago.

Which is the real Motown, and which is a mirage? Did I imagine the Roaring '20s charm of the up-and-coming groups playing Cliff Bell's Jazz Club in Grand Circus Park? Was the deliciousness of Midtown's Avalon International Bread Company's holiday stollen loaf more fleeting than fixed? Was Corktown's Sugar House bar really just covering up emptiness and destitution behind a false front of bustling occupancy as it celebrated the historical end of prohibition?

It's true that my Detroit experience is different than many others. I'm a lifelong resident of an outer suburb, and I went to a prestigious boarding school that you might remember Eminem making fun of in 8 Mile.

But the Detroit that I know and have come to love is one where lifelong residents and artistic newcomers gather to chat about neighborhood development over a cup of coffee; one where a weeknight open hearing on transit investment and bus schedule rerouting is packed to the edges with urban and suburban commuters alike. It is a city where occupancy in many central neighborhoods is approaching the upper-90th percentile, according to the downtown development booster D:hive."

More here.