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Biggest problems for Detroit aren't mentioned in the article at all. 1) Crime - Goes without saying Detroit continues to be one of if not the most dangerous la

• antidaily 11y ago
  Oakland is super dangerous too. Chicago has a million shootings every weekend. So what.
  • smtddr 11y ago
    The thing that gets lost in most statements similar to "$CITY is dangerous!", is that it's usually not the whole city. Parts of it are. If you know what parts and stay away from those, you'll be okay. There are parts of San Francisco that are probably pretty scary from the point-of-view of upper-middle-class folks but when you know SF well enough, you know where _not_ to go. - Mexico is a beautiful place with plenty to do on a family vacation, as long as you know where you're going. - Oakland has fantastic entertainment, art and food... as long as you know where you're going. - San Francisco is great; well-known as a major international tourist attraction... as long as you don't go to... http://www.vice.com/read/hunters-point-is-san-franciscos-radioactive-basement http://www.vice.com/read/hunters-point-is-san-franciscos-rad...
    • fiatmoney 11y ago
      If one has to live there and be familiar with the local geography in order to know precisely how to reduce one's risk of getting carjacked, it's fair to describe it as "dangerous". There is a real difference between "danger with pockets of safety" and the reverse.
      • smtddr 11y ago
        It's just that upper-middle class people tend not to have any street-smarts so they're afraid of any place that doesn't look shiny-and-glamorous..... and eventually, this conversation is going to take us to deeper uncomfortable social issues like this: http://www.newyorker.com/business/currency/what-to-do-when-your-app-is-racist http://www.newyorker.com/business/currency/what-to-do-when-y... "“rating system based on the personal views of Americans, a people historically known to mask the occasional racist view behind words like ‘dangerous’ ”—or, for that matter, “sketchy.”
      • adventured 11y ago
        As an example, London has plenty of violent crime, car jackings, robberies, rapes, et al. I don't think very many people would categorize it as an unsafe city per se, there are just areas you blatantly want to avoid. That's true of nearly every major city - indeed, there are only a few major cities where that isn't the case.
    • blisterpeanuts 11y ago
      "If you know what parts and stay away from those, you'll be okay." That's only true if the bad guys stay in their own neighborhoods. If the bad guys wander across your path, like for example to mug affluent people downtown or burglarize affluent homes, then you can't guarantee you'll be okay. What's more, it's not really "okay" that 45 people were murdered in one weekend in Chicago or Detroit, regardless of how isolated the ghetto is from the nicer areas. Every murder is a tragedy and rips a hole in the city. Ultimately it comes back to haunt the rest of the residents, no matter how much they may try to not think about it.
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    • greggman 11y ago
      Hmmm, there were two muggings in Noe Valley at the corner of Jersey and Noe when I was there. Yea, I know, anecdote. I heard one of them. It happened within 100 feet of my apartment at the corner. At the time I just thought it was some kids but found out the next day it was a mugging. Had my bike stolen from my garage there. Garage was closed. Also had 4 Japanese co-workers come for GDC and get mugged on Market between 6th and 7th. Broken teeth, concussions. Some friends of friends moved into an apartment in the mission near 20th and Harrison. They got robbed as they were carrying their boxes up the stairs to their new apartment. They didn't stay in SF. I don't consider SF "great"
      • rwallace 11y ago
        That sounds surprisingly bad. Are these considered good areas in San Francisco, or slightly iffy, or very dodgy?
        • puredemo 11y ago
          Noe Valley in particular is considered a very upper class area. The rest mentioned are all decent / above average.
          • rwallace 11y ago
            That's pretty grim, then. Are other US cities like that, or is it just San Francisco?
        • calbear81 11y ago
          Noe Valley has a lot more families and is generally seen as pretty safe as it's away from the shadier part of Mission. Japanese tourists getting jumped on Market St. between 6th and 7th is pretty crazy. I work on that block and I'm assuming they were on the SoMa side? There are a lot of crackheads and bums but they don't usually bother people. There are drug dealers across on the tenderloin side but they keep to themselves. Harrison and 20th is in a pretty gentrified area (1 block from popular climbing gym, 1 block from Trick Dog bar) so I'm surprised your friend got robbed there. Mostly a mix of high end condos, industrial warehouses, and cool bars. There is definitely a bit of a gang element in the area though.
    • sanoli 11y ago
      No city is a utopia, of course. Yet there are cities where you can take a stroll downtown on a wednesday night and you'll be fine even if you don't really know where you are. I grew up in Rio de Janeiro, where you have, HAVE to know where you're going, and I also took many long, random strolls in Tokyo after midnight. HUGE difference.
    • ZoeZoeBee 11y ago
      Every city has places you can't go, Detroit has places you can go, the rest you don't belong. I'd invite you to take a stroll from the East side of Detroit to the West Side of Detroit, feel free to choose any route you'd like so long as it is a straight line and tell me how it goes.
    • jamespitts 11y ago
      Totally agree with this. In Detroit there are many areas that have an acceptable street and neighborhood life, and you do have to be in the know. Even upper middle class areas with African Americans living there, and plenty of great working class areas. But these were somewhat outnumbered by the deserted or dangerous areas, a situation totally reversed in most US cities. It is ridiculous to say a city is dangerous. Far better to make a longer but nuanced description.
  • superuser2 11y ago
    Chicago is #3 by population, so all other things being equal it should have the 3rd highest number of murders.
    • antidaily 11y ago
      57 people got shot this weekend including a 10 year old girl.
      • superuser2 11y ago
        Yes, and Chicago isn't even in the top 30 U.S. cities by murder rate. It's a big place.
  • rhino369 11y ago
    And the parts of Chicago that has Detroit level crime are bombed out urban wasteland too. Chicago even has the same "collapsing and gentrifying" thing going on. The "good parts" are growing in population and economically as Millenials flood the city and eschew surburbs. But the South and West sides have vast areas with little property and falling population as families with two cents together move to the suburbs fleeing atrocious schools and violence.
• adventured 11y ago
  That 50% rate is very likely bogus. At best its almost entirely lacking supporting data. It derives from a study done decades ago, based on 26,000 national adults (which warns that it is too inaccurate to be projected at the local level). Like most similar stats, it has been abused ever since. Further, nowhere in any Detroit study has there been a conclusion that 50% of Detroit's entire population is not functionally literate. That's not an exaggeration, no such study exists stating those figures. http://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2011/05/06/detroit-literacy-numbers-questionable/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2011/05/06/detroit-lite...
  • IkmoIkmo 11y ago
    To add, there was a slightly less than 50% rate reported for a low level of literacy, but this isn't the same as illiteracy. Most developed countries have definitions that put around 10% of people as functionally illiterate, but also have definitions that put 20-30% of people as having very low levels of literacy, in fact the study that put Detroit at 47% puts it at roughly 25% nationwide. Further, this rate is based on an extrapolation from data from 25 years ago, done 22 years ago. Lastly, the literacy as the study defines it is based on a Congressional act which stipulates literacy in English. Those who don't know English are considered functionally illiterate in this study (and many others), despite being fully able to read and write in another language. e.g. read Spanish news, email, things at work, cooking recipes, software, manuals for their electronics. This obviously isn't optimal, government letters in English wouldn't be readable directly, but it's a world of difference compared to someone who is fully illiterate (which is a proxy for general education, too, and in this case often not applicable due to literacy/education in another language). Lastly the 47% figure carries a warning that it has confidence intervals larger than (-)5 at the 95% confidence level, how much it doesn't say but not a single other city carries this warning except one which has a 57% figure, and the rest of the country (and similar socioeconomic areas) are half the rate, so I would be completely uncomfortable ever citing this figure even in the context of 25 year old data, without at least finding out the actual confidence interval.
• jamespitts 11y ago
  Reducing problems down to "biggest" and you lose a lot of nuance into what is going on. IMO, crime and low education levels are symptoms that feed back into the deeper social breakdown that happened. So to illustrate one facet of the social breakdown: the implosion of local street-level business. I grew up in Los Angeles during what was the worst period of time for its inner cities, around the riots and the aftermath. Lots of street businesses burned, and there was fear that there would be an investment implosion. Perhaps the business community would do what the police department did (yeah, they pulled out at the beginning of the riots). But instead, Los Angeles restored normalcy to its communities, thanks to solid leadership and general empathy. Jobs were still around, businesses continued and expanded even in the toughest parts of town. And that is why LA thrives even with its many more dangerous pockets. Detroit outside of downtown was largely abandoned by its business community and "city fathers" (seems old fashioned to put it this way but it was the 1960s). You need more than a glitzy downtown, pristine museum, and freeways to have a functional society. On the street at the crucial moments of decision, it must have been rational thinking made by store owners to not invest or to move the store elsewhere. Maybe sprinkle some racism in there too. These local business folks must have sensed the direction of the wind. The core "powers that be" were not helping, and clearly could not find a way to halt the white flight. Maybe it was unsolvable, but looking at the history it seems that the city fathers did not pull all stops on keeping Detroit's population stable. Add to that the huge loss of industrial jobs. In an economic sense, all that was left was downtown pushing big gov solutions like "convention center" and "people mover" and "casino". Not to mention the GM plant and jail that destroyed half of what was Polish-town. Highly unsubtle solutions in the Pre-Gilbert era, most of which entirely ignored the importance of small, community-level business. So problems have causes and it feeds back into the problems. Without eyes on the street by shopkeepers, you have crime. Without nearby jobs, families do not have time to help their kids through school. The fix? Complicated.