Skip to main content ↑ ↓
Topic: Can Detroit get any worse? (Read 21076 times)

Re: Can Detroit get any worse?

Reply #25 –
Yes I do know about Flint and that is not a very good advert for anyone. However at the same time Flint although badly done is a tiny place compared to a city such as Detroit with such widespread poverty and the lack of water for numbers in the six figures a sad disgrace.
"Quit you like men:be strong"

Re: Can Detroit get any worse?

Reply #26 –
It's a strange thing to assist to a Country that lets an entire city to die as if it was a natural thing to happen. Live and let die should be their motto.

At least here the entire country dies all together, it's called solidarity...  :lol:
A matter of attitude.

Re: Can Detroit get any worse?

Reply #28 –
Uh-oh.
"Quit you like men:be strong"

Re: Can Detroit get any worse?

Reply #29 –
Can Detroit get any worse?


There's always Glasgow.......  :left:

Re: Can Detroit get any worse?

Reply #30 –
(Yawn, as a poor effort). Just think how this makes your country look Souther laddie. A would-be progressive modern democracy as it always boasts yet a bankrupt city, thousands homeless over 200,000 without regular drinking water and acres of street areas in bits. Mind you it is not the only place that has this happening but Detroit is certainly the worst and it is not a very impressive thing at all. More like something from a poor backward nation. And thrown the fact that it is essentially black who suffer but of course that is okay in the land of the free and home of the brave......
"Quit you like men:be strong"

Re: Can Detroit get any worse?

Reply #31 –
Detroit is cool again, headlines National Geographic

http://www.nationalgeographic.com/taking-back-detroit/see-detroit.html

The biggest secret? (not mentioned in that article) They've been actively everything that can't be saved, after which neighborhood committees turned the new open spaces into parks and such. I'd be curious to see how Detroit has changed since my last (and first) visit in '09.

Re: Can Detroit get any worse?

Reply #32 –
Quote from: Frenzie on
I'd be curious to see how Detroit has changed since my last (and first) visit in '09.

It depends on where you look. If you look at the development of the downtown riverfront and shopping and restaurants, things are looking up. If you look in the heart of the city, places like where my brother lives, it's scary. I might have mentioned earlier that he used to carry a gun when he mowed his lawn. And somebody shot through his window.

The house where I grew up has been wonderfully cared for. The house next door is boarded up. One can buy such a house for $5,000.

Re: Can Detroit get any worse?

Reply #33 –
Quote from: Jimbro3738 on
It depends on where you look. If you look at the development of the downtown riverfront and shopping and restaurants, things are looking up. If you look in the heart of the city, places like where my brother lives, it's scary. I might have mentioned earlier that he used to carry a gun when he mowed his lawn. And somebody shot through his window.

Right. And my main visit was actually to rich suburbs. What most stood out to me downtown was the incredible number of homeless people.

Re: Can Detroit get any worse?

Reply #35 –
Quote from: Belfrager on

Quote from: Jimbro3738 on
One can buy such a house for $5,000.

I think those are the kind of American houses that flyes with the winds...

They're the kinds of houses that exist in some older cities that have suffered severe decline. The history of Detroit's decline begins in the World War II period. Had there been no war, Detroit would be a much different city.

There are slums in many places in the world. The US isn't all that different. Perhaps you'll recognize the area where this video was taken.

[video]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=enWci1hBELE[/video]

Re: Can Detroit get any worse?

Reply #36 –
Quote from: Jimbro3738 on
There are slums in many places in the world. The US isn't all that different. Perhaps you'll recognize the area where this video was taken.

Yes I do, it doesn't exist for many years, those people were relocated for social houses. You don't have bidonvilles these days. Course it will re-appear soon.

I suppose you can't notice that that's an old Brazilian video trying to say that Europe has... poverty. Later on the video presents an european map with several countries taxes of poverty, all of them higher than Portugal...

Anyway my point with your houses wasn't the poverty aspects but your building techniques that can't stand against strong winds.
A matter of attitude.

Re: Can Detroit get any worse?

Reply #37 –
Quote from: Belfrager on

Anyway my point with your houses wasn't the poverty aspects but your building techniques that can't stand against strong winds.

I've been supposing it was intentional. :left:

Re: Can Detroit get any worse?

Reply #38 –
Quote from: Belfrager on
Anyway my point with your houses wasn't the poverty aspects but your building techniques that can't stand against strong winds.

¡Now I understand!

I looked for a favela in Portugal and was given that one. ¡Damned internet!
Is this better?

Re: Can Detroit get any worse?

Reply #39 –
One cannot help but feel for the countless numbers of people who had to flee the city of Detroit and so many of those left in it in big numbers cannot even get access to a basic thing like water? This is not Third World territory and how can such a damn thing happen in a modern nation?? Wherever such happens in the advanced West is a disgrace and sad matter. Other cities there have had serious probs and it goes beyond routine discussion or argument points of view. Every time I watch an item or documentary about Detroit is saddens me more than the routine. The widespread chance to but homes at relatively speaking next to nothing, acres of decline and destruction, large numbers who are struggling and have not moved like so many others. You have to feel for people in such a scene and that it exists is in a simple term a disgrace. I do hope things in the long - and wider term do get positively better.
"Quit you like men:be strong"

Re: Can Detroit get any worse?

Reply #40 –
Quote from: Jimbro3738 on
I looked for a favela in Portugal and was given that one. ¡Damned internet!

Well, the internet is right. Favela is not a portuguese word.
We use "bairro de lata" literally meaning neighbourhood (made) of thinfoil. Like French says bidon ville, city (made) of barrels.
Favela is "Brazilian" and means nothing per itself. Brazilians are good at inventing words with no meaning, saracuta, piriri, toporo and things like that.
A matter of attitude.

Re: Can Detroit get any worse?

Reply #41 –
Quote from: Belfrager on
Anyway my point with your houses wasn't the poverty aspects but your building techniques that can't stand against strong winds.


I'd like a specific case for analysis.

General building codes for this State require bracing to withstand shearing winds of up to 135mph. Or in other words an F2 pushing F3 tornado passing directly over your house without losing any structural integrity.

Re: Can Detroit get any worse?

Reply #42 –
Quote from: ensbb3 on
I'd like a specific case for analysis.

General building codes for this State require bracing to withstand shearing winds of up to 135mph. Or in other words an F2 pushing F3 tornado passing directly over your house without losing any structural integrity.

Specific cases are the constant images of (wood) houses in America being destroyed by winds everytime you have bad weather.

It's strange, 135mph it's a lot of km per hour, maybe the building codes are not respected, I don't know.
A matter of attitude.

Re: Can Detroit get any worse?

Reply #43 –
Quote from: Belfrager on
maybe the building codes are not respected, I don't know.

There's an argument to be had there. Small town inspectors, shotty craftsmanship, poor maintenance or bad decisions from the homeowner and age of the house can be factors but, for now, I feel this conversation needs to lean a bit towards how tornadoes work. (Modular homes are a concern too but even they require bracing and proper foundations, now, that help.)

The last tornado to cause the damage you speak of in my area was an F4 (+200mph-ish) seven or eight years ago. It'll be decades before that should happen again. I worked with a guy that built storm shelters some years back. And an above ground reinforced concrete structure, say 10x10(ft), that can withstand a +F4 will run ya north of $15k. I'm not sure how practical of a house budget (10x that size) is. Cost only goes up as the space increases. Now, you can get a prefab dug in shelter for less than $5k installed. So again, a hit to the practicality of making your whole house tornado proof.

But ok, they do fail... So why? The key is the shearing force.  The house is twisted due to pressure variance, not just pushed against. The roof is a fundamental part of the structural integrity of a wooden structure, so part of the bracing is preventing a corner of the roof from detaching under these forces. If it does you're now standing in a house of cards. Of course there's bracing in the walls and foundation mounts - blah blah. Not gonna bore you with building practice. You can amp up the wind resistance (as I assume they do out in the plains) at added cost. But at some point the smart man puts in a shelter and gets tornado insurance rather than prepare to come out unscathed from a 50 to 100 year event. 

One thing I've noticed is that tornadoes pass more to the north of us than they used to. Idk if that's a factor in what you're talking about or not?

Re: Can Detroit get any worse?

Reply #44 –
We don't have wood made houses here. Old houses in the countryside are made of stone and newer houses are always build with a reinforced concrete structure, external and internal walls made of construction bricks put together with a strong  mix of cement and sand.
We also don't have tornados, strongest winds are around 120 kmh with 140-150 gusts.

It's possible we do over build a bit but there's no insurance against such a bad weather that destroys a house, it would be considered as a "natural catastrophe" and, as such, out of every insurance coverage. Better to have strong houses.

At Scandinavia they use to build a lot with wood but I don't know about the winds they have there.
A matter of attitude.

Re: Can Detroit get any worse?

Reply #45 –
Quote from: Belfrager on
internal walls made of construction bricks put together with a strong  mix of cement and sand.

'Mortar' is the word for cement and sand mix used with bricks... if you're interested.

But yea, may be a tad over built. You'll find century or older buildings built like this east of the Mississippi River on almost every Main St. They are very much still there, so nothing to be said about that.

Wood construction has changed a lot. I'm most familiar with post 1950's. Materials and processing really started to change mid 70's to early 80's. They used to use a peer and beam technique with less standardized construction. Homes were "heavier" and built from rough cut oak or hickory. Those woods are less common now. But still, that's exactly how you build a house to be tornado fodder. Galvanized nails weren't so common either so some of those houses today are held together by perhaps nothing more than providence. Nowadays we use lighter woods. Pine or spruce - not as hard, but more flexible.

Re: Can Detroit get any worse?

Reply #46 –
On Mythbusters they've built wooden structures against Californian standards for testing with both earthquakes and heavy winds.

Re: Can Detroit get any worse?

Reply #47 –
My Detroit family alerted me to the fact that there's a Detroit façade near me.

Quote from: http://digital.olivesoftware.com/Olive/ODE/DFREEP/LandingPage/LandingPage.aspx?href=REZQLzIwMTYvMDMvMjU.&pageno=MQ..&entity=QXIwMDEwOQ..&view=ZW50aXR5

An American artist living in Europe made international headlines last month for moving an abandoned Detroit home to Europe and putting it on display at a major art fair.
   The project ignited a heated debate about whether it was a meaningful artistic statement that would draw attention to the city’s struggles or just another example of so-called ruin porn — the exploitation and glamorization of the city’s decay. But critical arguments and polemics at 10,000 feet are one thing. The reality on the ground is something else entirely.

[…]

Known as “The White House,” Mendoza’s project was one of the most-talked-about works on display in February at Art Rotterdam, before the house was shipped to its permanent home at the Verbeke Foundation, a privately owned but public exhibition site in Antwerp, Belgium. Mendoza — who was born in Pennsylvania but has lived in Europe for more than two decades — began looking for a house in America as a way of exploring his personal history. But once his friend Johnson suggested he expand his search to Detroit, the project became a parable about the decline of a once-thriving American city.

NB The Verbeke Foundation is located in East Flanders, not Antwerp.

Re: Can Detroit get any worse?

Reply #48 –
Quote from: Frenzie on
On Mythbusters

I used to watch it in the early seasons but I just cannot follow that show. Spends way too much time on problems and still gets them wrong. It may of gotten better. I wouldn't know but that sounds like territory they aren't any good at.

I can remember an episode they "busted" the "myth" that pissing on an electric fence would shock you. Spent all episode pouring water thru pipes and measuring voltages and distances. All that stuff that seems to make sense... I could probably hold up a 10 dollar bill at a bonfire, solicit a volunteer, and get to keep my 10 bucks to prove that wrong. It's not even a myth. Just redneck fun.

http://www.livescience.com/38024-electrocute-by-peeing-urine-electricity.html
This older article references this episode after a man died from pissing on an electric rail. Grrr.

Not saying they don't get stuff right. Just that catching all the variables isn't something they do well.

Re: Can Detroit get any worse?

Reply #49 –
Mythbusters is about methodology and entertainment. The results are perhaps the worst part of the show. Btw, they revisited that peeing thing and confirmed it. Iirc it's mostly about the distance, which is pretty logical. It's pretty hard to be electrocuted without an easy connection. Not impossible (e.g. lightning), but hard. :P