October 18, 2023
As a college undergraduate, I took a course on American cities, which jump-started my interest in urban systems and sociology. During that class, I did a project on the rise of Philadelphia and the 1876 Centennial Exposition. Hearing about the Centennial grounds, its turnout, and even Susan B. Anthony’s proclamation of women’s rights was just as juicy as an episode of Real Housewives of Atlanta (RHOA). Now, in post-grad – and still on Season 5 of RHOA – I realize a city’s history provides a foundation for its modern culture. Take the Detroit Institute of Art (DIA), for example.
Opened in 1888, formerly the Detroit Museum of Art, the museum was stationed on Jefferson Avenue after the public raised $100,000 (approximately $3 million today) for its construction. The museum’s success led to the opening of a second location on Woodward Avenue, a location known very well today.
The Jefferson Avenue location gradually lost its appeal after the 1930s. Come 1960, it would be torn down, leaving the DIA to be a beacon of Detroit’s culture for years to come. Relics of history’s past unveil multifarious lessons on building and sustaining popular cities. In the City of Detroit, these relics are best discovered by questioning the development of our built environment, otherwise known as the field of urban planning.
The urban planning field emerged between 1900 and 1910 as a response to a series of crises related to the Industrial Revolution. And today, every planner defines it differently. Urban planning is multidisciplinary and focuses on the design, regulation, and development of metropolitan spaces with the goal of advancing the public interest by rational, strategic action.
Detroit was here long before urban planning became an accredited profession. The two only started to merge once French explorer Antoine de la Mothe Cadillac arrived in 1701. At the time, Detroit occupied three Anishinaabe nations of the Council of Three Fires – the Ojibwe, Ottawa, and Potawatomi. The Anishinaabe name for Detroit, “Waawiyatanong,” describes how the land was at the time and its prosperous relationship to the water.
During his time in Detroit, Cadillac used his status to build his fortune. He began platting ribbon farms, supporting agricultural efforts and land distribution. Shortly after, he began charging his new settlers annual rent and a cut of their crops. This did not go over well, and Cadillac was called out for lining his pockets before the French Government transferred him to Louisana in 1710.
Detroit stayed under French rule until 1760, when the British took ownership. Then, in 1796, after the signing of Jay’s Treaty, Britain handed the land over to the newly established United States and evacuated the entire Northwestern Territory. Things flowed smoothly for the settlement as new owners began buying land. Land ownership became less white-owned after Jacob Young, the city’s first Black landowner, bought land in 1793. However, in 1805, the settlement’s growth halted once an unknown fire broke out. The Great Fire of 1805 nearly destroyed everything despite the public’s attempt to save their territory through a bucket brigade.
This tragedy launched the federal government to take over with newly appointed Chief Justice Augustus B. Woodward by their side. Two months after the fire, Judge Woodward, appointed by President Jefferson, made it his mission to rebuild the land. He modeled the new city after Washington, D.C., giving Detroit Campus Martius, Grand Circus Park, and a few other parks. Unfortunately, this plan was never completed, yet elements from his design, such as hexagonal street blocks and large circular civic areas, continue to be seen in the city’s current landscape.
From 1805 to 1900, the environmental and health effects of the Industrial Revolution largely altered the urban landscape. Cities implemented underground wastewater systems and building codes to protect their inhabitants. City improvements became incremental but sadly failed to provide coordinated, comprehensive plans. Ideas like Ebenezer Howard’s Garden City presented urban structure with a new strategy to connect green space to urban spaces. After the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago, City Beautiful plans started to emulate an enhanced aesthetic environment for city inhabitants.
In Detroit, architect Edward H. Bennett carried on components from Woodward’s plan, such as thoroughfares and parks, in his 1915 preliminary plan. Bennett’s preliminary plan for Detroit also included other elements: long diagonals, riverfront development, placemaking, and an emphasis on parks. Sadly, this plan was not completed either.
One of the limitations of early planning involved the uncertainty of implementing plans. However, the need for parks, civic services, and sanitary reform largely stems from the work of the Settlement House Movement. Founded by middle-class women, settlement houses fought to raise values in poor immigrant neighborhoods by pushing cities to open playgrounds, create recreation departments, and clean up urban streets. Their work sincerely supported urban planning’s growth by ushering the public to engage in their built environment.
After their involvement, urban planning slowly formed, focusing on public interest rather than private interest. Ironically, urban renewal projects after the 1950s often went against this principle, especially in Black and Indigenous Communities. In Detroit, the demolition of the Detroit Museum of Art resulted from the construction of I-75, the Chrysler Freeway. When looking at redevelopment projects that hope to address the issues of urban renewal, like the I-375 Reconnecting Communities Project, I question whether these planning efforts fall within the public interest or if the quests to restore communities like Black Bottom and Paradise Valley are simply iterations of the past.
Nevertheless, Detroit’s early and modern history is irrefutably a model city to study the history of great American cities. The development of urban planning in Detroit continues to be a significant factor in understanding how cities can learn from the relics of the past to plan for an equitable, sustainable future.
Written by Jacques Jones, Fall 2023 Let’s Detroit Campus Influencer
