Detroit’s sidewalks are seeing increased traffic

Excerpts from the story:

For the past 50 years or so this city hasn't just been defined by building cars, it has been defined by driving them. They have shaped its exteriors, its interiors, and its psyche.

But a drive-by city may not make sense either. Detroit, or at least its leadership, is starting to rethink the city's car-happy habitat and history. The city center has started to see some life again. Businesses, like IT giant Compuware, have moved downtown. There are new parks. The Tigers baseball team decided to stay and build a new stadium rather than move out in 2000. The Lions football team actually moved from the suburbs back downtown in 2002. The city scored Major League Baseball's All Star game last summer and the Superbowl in February. It's almost enough to make the people here think about setting foot on sidewalks again - almost. Standing in the way? A whole lot of automobiles.

The city isn't just trying to remake itself, it's trying to change its ethos, which is welded to the car.

With numbers aside, there are tangible signs of change here in the Motor City, indications that "walk" is less a four-letter word than it once was.

A small strip of Woodward Avenue, Detroit's main drag, has seen new office buildings go up. Those buildings have drawn people and things like bookstores, and, yes, even Starbucks - the gauge of an urban pulse. Loft apartments are going into old warehouse space and some young people are moving in. The city's development of a park and skating rink, Campus Martius, has drawn some foot traffic. There are even a few more souls on the chronically under-peopled People Mover.

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