DMC expands campus

The News reports that the Detroit Medical Center will build a new, $34 million pediatric center on Beaubien Street, across from the existing Children's Hospital. This will be the first expansion of DMC's campus in thirty years.

Another new restaurant in Midtown

According to Crain's Detroit, Slows Bar BQ will open a second location next summer at the northwest corner of Cass Avenue and Alexandrine Street (map).

More fine dining in Detroit

The News notes new restaurants and a grocer opening in Corktown, Downtown, and Midtown.

Find out about Wayne State's master plan

Cityscape Detroit is presenting a series of four speakers who will discuss the neighborhoods that border Woodbridge. The first event features James Sears, a Wayne State official, who will discuss the university's master plan and its longterm vision of Midtown. The free, open meeting will be Feb. 25 at 6:30 pm at the Contemporary Art Institute of Detroit, which is located at 5141 Rosa Parks Blvd.

Hat tip: Model D.

Ilitch takes control of Masonic Temple

According to the News, Mike Ilitch's Olympia Entertainment is taking over management of the Masonic Temple, which was facing foreclosure in March for unpaid taxes.

Together Mike and Marian Ilitch currently control Little Caesars Pizza, the Detroit Tigers, the Detroit Red Wings, Comerica Park, the Fox Theatre, Hockeytown Cafe, the MotorCity Casino, and a block of land expected to become the site of a new hockey arena for the Red Wings. In other words, they own downtown Detroit.

How Wayne State has changed

Preserve Detroit describes how outgoing President Irvin Reid has transformed Wayne State's campus and contributed to the construction boom in Midtown.

Forest Arms fire: what was lost

• Photos of the Forest Arms apartment building

• A Metrotimes article on Peoples Records and another profile from Click on Detroit

• Amsterdam Espresso

For more links and info, follow the thread on Detroit Yes!.

Update I: Click on Detroit has news and a slideshow of photos of the fire: "Apartment Blaze Leaves 100 Homeless; 1 Feared Dead".

More photos of the fire on Flickr. Hat Tip: The Daily Swarm, which has a letter from Brad Hales of Peoples Records.

Update II: More photos from Detroit Funk.

Update III: One more photo set of the fire. This tragedy was well documented.

Huge fire near Wayne State

A five-alarm fire erupted in the historic Forest Arms apartment building at Second & Forest Ave. this morning. Thankfully, there have been no serious injuries reported, but it looks like Amsterdam Espresso will be lost and Peoples Records will have to relocate.

Cass Corridor in context

Lately lots of new developments have been announced for the Cass Corridor, or what's now known as Midtown. This is a total transformation from the past when the area was possibly the seediest neighborhood in Detroit.

Back in February, Detroit Blog discussed the history of the Cass Corridor and explored the once notorious, now abandoned Hotel Fort Wayne at the corner of Cass and Temple:

Before there was Midtown, there was Cass Corridor, Detroit’s notorious skid row. Back then, before marketers and urban planners began efforts to gentrify it and remake it as a cultural urban enclave, it was the wild, lawless home of the dregs of society – prostitutes, junkies, alcoholics, homeless, the mentally ill, perverts and all-around weirdos.

It's great reading.

Here comes gentrification?

The Detroit News reports on five new developments planned for Woodward between Warren and Mack, the area where MOCAD, the Majestic Theater, Union Street, and the Whitney currently stand:

For now, the seven-block strip is simultaneously bustling and abandoned, with hipsters and middle-class professionals sharing the neighborhood with more than a few aggressive panhandlers. Many investors are working hard to make 2008 the year the strip becomes almost totally gentrified -- if they can convince bankers and sometimes even landlords that they are the ones who can succeed.

Creative corridor

The Detroit News reports on the state's efforts to attract the film industry to Michigan, including a 35% rebate on film production costs and low- or no-interest loans. This is part of a broader effort to transition the economy to serve "the creative class": young professionals, media workers, and the bohemian types who are supposedly the key to our economic future. MetroMode reports that local leaders hope to draw such workers and build the economy by making Woodward a creative corridor lined with media-oriented and "knowledge" jobs.

A creative corridor sounds smart to me. Woodward is already lined with creative businesses and cultural institutions , and there's every incentive to add more. That's what's happening in Midtown, and it's encouraging to see. But I don't think media-work is likely to replace the auto industry any time soon as Detroit's economic engine.

And incentives for film production? More than three dozen states are trying that. We'd be better off supporting the growing local film industry than competing in a race to the bottom to attract Hollywood productions.

Cass corridor development

In the past few years downtown Detroit and Midtown, the area around Wayne State, have seen lots of new development. Last week Crain's Detroit wrote about new projects on Woodward and Cass that will start to bridge the gap between the two. The lower Cass Corridor may one day lose its status as Detroit's Skid Row.