"i was in the pool": of shrinkage and flint, michigan

Where the economy is making life difficult for many formerly flourishing industrial cities, there is a glimmer of opportunity that comes in an otherwise counter-intuitive plan.

The Michigan city of Flint is a poster-child for the decline of auto-centric Midwest cities. Once a city of 200,000 and growing, the population of Flint has been cut in half over the last 4 decades. So rather than continue to watch and wait while their city decomposes and more city blocks become abandoned, Flint has decided to get proactive.

Flint, which has long been shrinking, will now assist its own shrinkage by bulldozing entire blocks and neighborhoods and returning the land to the forest that predates its population.

An interesting strategy, indeed, Costanza.

The New York Times Article Link