Magnificent Decay: Detroit by Drone

[BT]

Detroit Mix FPV

[Plane]

http://www.geek.com/articles/geek-cetera/technology-and-art-collide-as-16-quadcopters-give-a-light-and-sound-show-20120628/



MEET YOUR CREATOR - QUADROTOR SHOW

[BT]

Cudos to the choreographer and the pilots.

[Plane]

Cudos to the choreographer and the pilots.

  There is no pilot, 100% robot show.

[Plane]

Prototype Quadrotor with Machine Gun!



http://www.geek.com/articles/geek-cetera/quadcopter-modified-to-carry-machine-gun-20120423/

[Plane]

Robot Quadrotors Perform James Bond Theme
http://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2012-03/video-grasp-lab-quadcopters-jam-out-james-bond-theme

  Some of the same engineers as the "meet your creator" show.


World's first manned flight with an electric multicopter




  Well ........I guess it doesn't count as a "drone" if you are riding it.

[Plane]

Back at its mid-20th Century peak - before the race riots, before white flight, before the decline and fall of General Motors - Detroit had a population of close to 2 million. Since then it's shed more than half its population and now, according to City Farmer, "about 30% of Detroit is now vacant land — about 40 square miles, by one estimate." Forty square miles is roughly the size of San Francisco.

You can see the change in the city in these maps of population density from Wayne State's Center for Urban Studies:
http://mapscroll.blogspot.com/2009/06/shrinking-of-detroit.html

This smattering of houses amidst vacant lots looks positively pastoral, but it's within walking distance of the old Tiger Stadium as well as the once-illustrious Michigan Central Station (pictured below). Places like this are common around Detroit

So what can be done to save a city that seems to be evaporating away? The Telegraph discusses one approach that might make sense:
The government looking at expanding a pioneering scheme in Flint, one of the poorest US cities, which involves razing entire districts and returning the land to nature.

Local politicians believe the city must contract by as much as 40 per cent, concentrating the dwindling population and local services into a more viable area.

   Generally we think of growth as success and shrinkage as less .
   But there will from time to time be a need for population to migrate , has there been much history of "right sizing" something like a big city?
     Can it be viewed positively?


http://www.detroityes.com/home.htm

[Plane]

http://www.e-volo.com/general-news/vc2-at-airventure-in-oshkoshusa

[Plane]

http://chuckleaduck.com/

[BT]

Both Detroit and New Orleans are rife with real estate opportunities.

[Plane]

   A century ago Galveston Texas was leveled by a storm , when they rebuilt they didn't just build a better sea wall, they dumped so much fill inside the wall that they made that sort of flooding unlikely for the next century.

    In spite of that Galveston never regained its importance as the main port in the region.

    I wonder if there are any examples of citys shrinking gracefully and beneficially?

     Growth is hard to manage , but nobody wants shrinkage so shrinkage winds up not being managed at all.