Wednesday, March 10, 2010

An interesting new twist on urban renewal / eminent domain.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/mar/09/detroit-looks-at-downsizing-to-save-city/

1 comment:

hannah said...

Well, it's not new. Eminent domain was always a central component of a program that aimed to relocate the residents of real estate that would be more valuable without them.
What's new is that instead of holding out the promise of re-development and the vain prospect that the same residents would be able to return and enjoy everything spanking new, including upgraded public services, the proposal is to revert the landscape to mother nature and work with her to make it productive.
Whether mother nature is more accommodating than the developers, who pocketed subsidies and delivered nothing tangible besides parking lots, really depends on whether people work to make the landscape productive.
Many modern day "environmentalists" are a lot like the early settlers arriving in New England who thought the well-tended fields and woodlands teeming with wildlife had been created just for them by a munificent God, rather than by the natives whom small pox had all killed off.
In real life, gardening is a lot of work.