City of Detroit: America’s best urban biking?

John R with four one-way vehicle lanes
and negligible traffic — an urban
cyclist dream street.
We think so.
Apparently former New Yorker Toby Barlow may as well according to this Metromode article:
Toby Barlow finds it ironic that Detroit is known as the “Motor City”, since its flat and relatively calm streets make it the country’s most [...]

Dequindre Trail construction set to begin

Both Crain’s and Model D are reporting updates on the trail connection between the Dequindre Cut and the RiverWalk.
From the Crain’s article:
The Economic Development Corporation of the city of Detroit today approved a $871,900 contract with Detroit-based WCI Contractors Inc. for an 800-foot extension of the Dequindre Cut, the Dequindre Trail extension, to begin in [...]

Palmer Park Green Art Fair

Sunday, June 28, 2009 2 ~ 7 PM
Bluesman, Luther “Bad Man” Keith (above), Ralph Koziarski, Cheryl Strebel, Anthony T. Womack, Robert Thibodeau, Angel and the BADmen and many others fill Palmer Park with music on June 28th
In the 1970’s and 80’s the Palmer Park Art Fair was Detroit’s premier art [...]

Teaming Up To Teach Sustainability

The YMCA Trailblazer group proudly stands behind
their plantings (photo: S Roeth)
The Boll Family YMCA and the Majestic Café are teaming up this summer to teach kids about sustainability. The Majestic Café has secured a garden plot in downtown Detroit that the Trailblazers from the YMCA Daycamp program will take care of for the [...]

Detroit Synergy Project Clean in Southwest Detroit

[ June 6, 2009; 8:00 am to 1:00 pm. ] Join us, and Southwest Solutions (SWSOL), on June 6th for their 3rd Annual Southwest Detroit Neighborhood Beautification Day from 8:00am to 1:00pm.
This is one of the largest events SWSOL will have this year, with 10 different locations and tasks that will be completed that day, including park beautification; Southwest Housing Solutions’ apartment buildings landscaping; senior citizen house [...]

Make your City More Bike Friendly With Energy Block Grants

The excuse of not having money to make your community more bike friendly just got a whole lot weaker thanks to Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grants (EECBG).
This funding is another a portion of the overall economic stimulus package and it can fund bicycling planning, construction, and programming:
Entities may develop and implement programs to conserve [...]

Reshaping Detroit: Villages and Greenways

“This continent has not seen a transformation like Detroit’s since the last days of the Maya. The city, once the fourth largest in the country, is now so depopulated that some stretches resemble the outlying farmland and others are altogether wild.”
– From “Detroit Arcadia“, Harper’s Magazine, 2007. At nearly 140 square miles, Detroit is a [...]

Green Networking Event

May 27, 2009, 6-8pm
Join a monthly Green Drinks Networking event on Wednesday May 27, 2009 at the Majestic Café on Woodward in Detroit from 6-8pm. Come share ideas, innovations and motivations centered on sustainability and green living in metro Detroit.
Green Drinks is an international movement that brings like-minded individuals and organizations together to [...]

Belle Isle Botanical Society Annual Plant Sale

Saturday May 23, 2009
Memorial Day Weekend
9:00 AM to 3:00 PM in the greenhouses on Belle Isle

The doors open at 9 am on May 23 at the Belle Isle Greenhouses. We recommend that you come early to secure the choices tomato and flower offerings. A wide variety of heirloom and hybrid tomatoes, unusual perennials, annuals, herbs, [...]

Detroit Abides free May Movie – FLOW

[ May 20, 2009; 7:00 pm to 9:00 pm. ] watch FLOW and talk about the Water Crisis
Detroit Evolution Laboratory
Wednesday, May 20, 2009, 7:00pm – 9:00pm
Eastern Market’s Shed 5

Great Lakes Bioneers Detroit, Detroit Evolution Laboratory, and Eastern Market Corporation come together on the third Wednesday of every month to present Detroit Abides, A Free Sustainability Gathering in Eastern Market’s Shed 5. The event features a [...]