Mayor Dave Bing, during his public address launching the Detroit Works ProjectMayor Dave Bing says
as an outcome of re-writing Detroit's master plan.
Bing launched the
in September to engage residents in crafting a new master plan. Three months later, the administration appears to have set in place the new plan's broad outlines.
Bing says residents in the affected areas will be incentivized to move to one of 7-9 “population centers.” The city, he says, will no longer provide services to nearly 45 square miles of Detroit once the plan is fully implemented.
Bing says the specific population centers haven’t yet been determined.
DOWNSIZING DETROIT
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Re-writing the city’s master plan has been a cornerstone of the Bing Administration’s agenda. The city struggles with an everlarger inventory of vacant land as Detroit's population continues to fall from a peak of nearly two million after World War II. Bing says he expects the 2010 Census to mark the current population between 800,000-850,000 people.
The planning effort got off to a rocky start earlier this year when Bing was criticized for
to describe eventual outcomes.
That rhetoric lead to critics to suggest Bing was planning a radical realignment of Detroit’s population, akin to the forced relocation of Native Americans in the 19th century.
Even pundits favorable to a new master plan, like Free Press columnist Rochelle Riley, publicly wished to reset the discussion.
Karla Henderson, the city's group executive of planning and facilities, says the Detroit Works Project will continue to work with the residents as they finalize details on the plan. She says the city plans to hold 40 more public community meetings this spring.