Tag

Michigan

Tag

Michigan

Palmer Park Apartment Buildings

Palmer Park

The Palmer Park Apartment Building Historic District, well regarded for its ornate and varied examples of active and abandoned apartment buildings, is located in the Palmer Park neighborhood of Detroit, Michigan.

Lee Plaza

Lee Plaza

Lee Plaza is one of those iconic abandonments of Detroit, Michigan that stands out as a prime example of what went wrong with the city in the latter half of the 20th century, and is a pillar of potential along West Grand Boulevard. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places, Lee Plaza is an excellent representation of Art Deco from the 1920s and was at one point, a luxurious apartment complex that offered hotel amenities to its wealthy residents.

Lafayette Building

The Lafayette

Many moons ago, I had the opportunity to explore the Lafayette Building in downtown Detroit, Michigan with two friends. It was a blustery, cold Sunday morning and there was not a soul out. No pedestrians and very few cars. In retrospect, I wish I had spent more time at the Lafayette. I only saw the interior once and that was brief – it was more photogenic than I imagined despite years of abuse and alterations.

Biggest Population Losses

After a recent drive through Cairo, Illinois (article forthcoming), and seeing the effects of decades of racial segregation and violence, and then economic decline and population loss, I wondered what other major and minor cities in the United States has experienced such steep and dramatic losses? Besides Cairo, Detroit and Wheeling, I asked my Facebook readers of other examples.

Deerton, Michigan

Deerton, Michigan is an unincorporated community in Alger County that was founded in 1882 when the Detroit, Mackinac & Marquette Railroad constructed a station for a lumbering camp. A post office opened in 1922, and in 1926, a small school was constructed at the junction of Deerton-Onota Road. Today, not much is left in the community – most of the residences are abandoned, although the school still operates.

Packard Motors

The Packard Motor Company on East Grand Boulevard in Detroit, Michigan was constructed in 1903 and closed in 1958. With just the exception of a brief reuse in several locations, the entire complex – 3.5 million square feet over 35 acres, produced 1.5 million vehicles. Designed by Albert Kahn, the industrial complex used reinforced concrete for its construction, a first for Detroit.