May 8, 2014
If you’ve read much about Detroit in the news lately, it hasn’t been good. Facing $18 billion in debt, Detroit declared Chapter 9 bankruptcy last July, becoming the largest U.S. city ever to do so. Its population, having dwindled from a 1950s peak of 1.86 million, is now just 700,000. Roughly half of Detroit’s residents aged 25-64 are unemployed. Its violent crime rate is one of the worst in the nation. Approximately 20 square miles of land within the city — roughly the size of Manhattan — sit empty, where abandoned and blighted buildings have been leveled. An estimated 80,000 abandoned buildings remain in pockets scattered across the city’s 138 square miles.
UK alumnus designs Detroit’s future
May 8th 2014, The Lane Report – reprinted from Kentucky Alumnni magazine’s spring 2014 issue.