I tried Detroit, I lived in Michigan for seven years. There was a girl that I was quite infatuated with who I almost moved their for... Anyway.
Detroit might have a couple of baubles, like airports, but honestly everyone that I have met at Saturday House and in the hacker community would wind up utterly *HATING* the place. I grew up in a town where the Klan marches and shuts down the downtown, where people are still proud about hosting the last of the 60's political assassination, etc. Then I moved to the home base of the Michigan militia, (i.e. Oklahoma City Bombing). With that as the background, I will tell you I have never met more close minded racists as I have in Detroit. The people who are left are the dead enders, the ones who can't and won't accept change no matter what. They are the frogs who have been sitting in the bottom of the pot as the heat has been cranking higher and higher. And the idea of walking or riding a bike in a city where the entire infrastructure is based around cars and has inches of snow on the ground for five months of the year... On Tue, Apr 7, 2009 at 2:46 PM, Sarah <[email protected]> wrote: > I was talking about this Detroit concept with a couple of people at sxsw. > As Robert said: > >>The problem is location, location, location. That was an twenty >>minutes from a traffic signal, hour from a small city and and hour >>and half from a bad airport that could at least get you a connecting >>flight to civilization about twice a day. > > And that's the beauty of Detroit. It already has airports and train > stations. It already has paved roads. For what you would spend on five > years of office rental in San Francisco, you could buy out ten square blocks > of three-bedroom houses in Detroit and fill them all with hackers. Imagine > the startup possibilities. And the beauty of hackers is that we can work > from anywhere. We seem to already be congregating into our own "tech" > cities, why not just take that last step and all be a bike ride from one > another? > > Sarah > > On Tue, Apr 7, 2009 at 12:51 PM, anders conbere <[email protected]> wrote: >> >> On Tue, Apr 7, 2009 at 9:11 AM, Robert Eickmann <[email protected]> >> wrote: >> > >> > Tumbleweed houses aren't that cheap... >> > >> > Looking at the website they are running about 36k-50k per house. >> > >> > Back in the midwest that is about right for a small house in certain >> > parts of the country. (You know the kind with a bedroom or two and a >> > bathroom). >> > >> > For example my family bought a 28 acre farm with a house and two out >> > buildings and a corn crib for $90k. >> > >> > I almost bought a wonderful two bedroom lake cottage that was fully >> > winterized with 30' of lake front for $120k. >> > >> > The problem is location, location, location. That was an twenty >> > minutes from a traffic signal, hour from a small city and and hour >> > and half from a bad airport that could at least get you a connecting >> > flight to civilization about twice a day. >> > >> > And to address Anders thought that you can build a community in >> > detroit if you buy enough of the land.... it won't work. To actually >> > form a community and not just have a bunch of young people without >> > children (because the second you even suggest to a mother about >> > putting their young child into the Detroit public school system, they >> > will rip you to pieces). I could tell you some serious horror stories >> > about Michigan schools... >> >> If only I could have claimed to make it up >> >> >> http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090313/LIFESTYLE/903130306 >> >> ~ Anders >> >> > >> > And if you were to actually build some nice houses and form a >> > community inside of the city of Detroit, the outside community will >> > tear you to pieces at every chance they can. Heck a local art >> > community (they had I think 120 people working on it) built a really >> > cool public art structure in a park last year with in three weeks it >> > was torched.... >> > >> > -Rob >> > >> > >> > >> > On Tue, Apr 7, 2009 at 11:28 AM, Patrick Haller >> > <[email protected]> wrote: >> >> >> >> On Mon, Apr 06, 2009 at 09:39:05PM -0700, Ryan Kabir wrote: >> >>> This thread made my day. The tumbleweed houses have me VERY excited. I >> >>> could do >> >>> a shipping container as well. How difficult do you think it would be >> >>> to get my >> >>> container loaded onto a ship *with me in it* ? >> >>> >> >>> mwahahhahaha >> >> >> >> It'd be cool to use the social impetus to find cheep housing to build a >> >> better community. i.e. if you think you'll be in one place for more >> >> than >> >> 5 years, getting a sub-5% mortgage on a condo with other like-minded >> >> people in the near units could work out well. >> >> >> >> Counter-cyclical investing = the goodness. ;) >> >> >> >> >> >> Patrick >> >> >> >> > >> >> >> > >> > > >> > >> >> > > > > > --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ Website: http://saturdayhouse.org/ Post: [email protected] Unsubscribe: [email protected] -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
