The Disaggregated City:
The Afterlife of Leftover Spaces in Deindustrializing Detroit
Book Proposal in Five Detroit Neighborhoods: Brightmoor, Delray, Poletown East, Riverbend, Mapleridge
This project critically examines the ongoing urban transformation of inner-city neighborhoods largely characterized by a surplus of spatial dilapidation and abandonment, entrenched disinvestment, and withdrawal of municipal services.
After experiencing a long arc of deindustrialization and persistent financial instability, Detroit has become a prototype for what we call a "POST-URBAN CITY," a peculiar type of composite urbanism in the hypermodern age of global capitalism.
Collaborators:
Martin Murray, María Arquero de Alarcón, Olaia Chivite Amigo
Duration: March 2025-present
Location: Detroit
Project: Book proposal
Our ongoing research in Detroit addresses three interrelated questions:
- How can we account for the historically specific trajectories that have characterized the patterns of sustained decline in these neighborhoods?
- In the face of fiscal austerity and the withering away of public services, how have NGOs, philanthropic organizations, private companies, and grassroots efforts filled in the gaps in the social fabric?
- How have these initiatives activating vacant land taken place outside conventional governance structures and regulatory frameworks of the public administration of urban space?
We seek to advance a novel approach to interrogating the assemblage of distinctive organizing principles that characterize the post-urban city: discontinuous and uneven patterns of spatial fragmentation, fiscal austerity, the withering away of public administration of urban spaces, and the emergence of non-state actors and do-it-yourself initiatives that have largely replaced municipal service provision.
Take Brightmoor as an example:
Brightmoor, a 4-square-mile Detroit neighborhood first settled in the 1920s by Appalachian migrants, long carried a reputation for poverty and instability. After white flight in the 1970s, the area suffered a massive decline, losing over half its housing stock and nearly half its population by 2010, with poverty exceeding 45 percent.
B.E. Taylor Homes and Archival Images
B.E. Taylor Subdivisions Data and Map
Today, Brightmoor faces staggering vacancy, with over half its land now empty lots. The Detroit Land Bank Authority controls many abandoned parcels, while speculative ownership, predatory landlords, and failed “rent-to-own” schemes destabilize residents further. Urban farms and grassroots initiatives struggle against bureaucratic hurdles, absentee landlords, and overlapping claims. The area has become known for its combination of resilience and lawlessness, characterized by dumping, squatting, and informal enforcement by residents.
Blight/Dumping
Initiatives
NDND HOUSE
Non-Profit Organization’s Housing Program
Brightmoor remains dominated by single-family housing, though nearly half its land is vacant or derelict. In the 2000s, tax foreclosures transferred thousands of properties to public and nonprofit ownership, enabling groups like Northwest Development Neighborhood Development (NDND) to launch a 2003 rent-to-own program.
Promising affordable homeownership, NDND built scattered houses funded by tax credits and bank loans, but vague agreements and poor oversight left tenants paying excessive rents without gaining ownership. When tax credits expired, many faced higher costs, poor maintenance, and eviction threats.
FARMSTEADS
Bottom-Up Community Effort
Despite these challenges, Brightmoor shows signs of hope. Philanthropic organizations and grassroots groups have stepped in to fill gaps left by retreating municipal services, while residents organize for safety and revitalization.
Founded in 2014, the Brightmoor Artisans Collective (BAC) combats food insecurity by running gardens, a pantry, and a shared kitchen while fostering community engagement, land trusts, and producers’ cooperatives.
GREEN STORMWATER INFRASTRUCTURE
Top-Down Initiatives
In 2017 and 2022, Detroit Water and Sewer Department (DWSD) unveiled Green infrastructure proposals, the Brightmoor Stormwater Improvement Project and bio-retention ponds, aiming to address flooding and create new landscapes.
The conflicting visions of resilient “Green Infrastructure“ represent the tensions between top-down infrastructure projects and bottom-up community efforts. Yet, these approaches illustrate competing visions of how Brightmoor’s future might be reimagined.