Hayward

I never new Bay City had it's own municipal utility provider. They have the giant ConsumersEnergy Plant right there north of downtown which provides electricity to millions.....following these state regulations. I didn't know such entity "Bay City Electric Light & Power" existed, or even if it should exist. This is really sad.

Yes! Welcome! I love these threads, and excellent photos. I cannot believe how long that place was in operation.

That's a beautiful cornice at the top. If only they could continue to build those today.

There isn't much surface parking. The city has always viewed this as an evil for years and required any new parking to be underground. In fact areas where some surface parking does exist will be replaced with several levels of underground parking, recapped and sold off to private developers. There are many beautiful buildings here that will likely never be demolished. But there are an unfortunate few that are unprotected, so when density shoots up, they'll like be replaced by taller structures. BTW, here's an good areial of the city. Move to the upper right hand corner of the photo, where that brownish tall building is. That's the area covered by this thread. As you can see, this area is quite small and distant in relationship to downtown. http://flickr.com/photos/photons/47861899/sizes/o/in/set-253454/ This is a photo of campus: http://flickr.com/photos/photons/1246420318/sizes/o/ As you can see, it's difficult to tell where campus ends and city begins. It's kind of mixed in. However there are clear boundaries. This map helps illustrate that. There are outliers, but they don't really serve students, rather home to agencies, organizations, or research arms affiliated with the U. (The map will flash once when loading, then reappear) http://www.plantext.bf.umich.edu/campus.maps/CentralMedical3D.pdf

It's always interesting how Madison and Ann Arbor compare themselves. They should be sister cities because of their relatively friendly relationships toward one another on the urban side of things. Even their school newspapers like to compare to the two positively.

^ Lol Agreed. Great photos inside the place though. Mine were unfortunately very blurry.

If you want to be rude to Toronto, it's a slight step beneath Bloor...oooo!

I really love the compactness of buildings downtown. Small footprints, but very heavy in appearance.

Love these threads of working class cities. Well done

Ann Arbor's South University district is located just South East of the University of Michigan and caters strongly to the student population. It hasn't quite been overrun by your typical college town eateries and retail yet, but increasing density in the area is beginning to reshape the area. It's very busy, but that doesn't mean everyone likes it. Some feel it's dated and ugly and would prefer to see much of it leveled and rebuilt. Those people tend to identify with the more tasteful and urban cohesiveness of the State and Liberty districts and downtown. But some like it the way it is and don't want it to change. Interesting thing is, historic photos show this area entirely uninspiring, filled with small homes in the early half of the last century. The 60's were definitely a boom for this area as the homes were leveled and replaced with retail and student housing. It might be a history somewhat close to parts of Toronto. I threw in a few University buildings nearby, although I intend to do a University and Downtown Ann Arbor thread later. University of Michigan ----------------------> South U Walking through U of M's "Diag" you can see the South U district just ahead through the arch. After you exit through the arch, the landscape quickly changes from academic to commercial. U of M calls this a "town-gown" relationship. The U has since overgrown its historic boundaries and spilled throughout the city weaving between businesses and apartment buildings. The lines between campus and city have become very blurred Left, the new Zaragon Student Housing Development. Right, U of M's School of Social Work This beauty was unfortunately leveled for Zaragon The South U Business District U of M's East Hall overshadows some businesses. Ann Arbor's ugliest building in the distance. The inside is no more attractive either. Developers are planning to knock down the Village Corner Grocery Store for new student housing. And Here's what it looks like. Dish out the precast brick! :yuck: South U has had an influx of many new asian restaurants in the last decade. Developers in the late 90's originally wanted to demolish the block and fill it with these red brick apartments, but failed. Only one got built shown here, completed in 1997 The Galleria is a 3-story indoor mall that failed....somewhat. What succeeded were the stores that had entrances on the exterior. The mall has since been reconfigured and almost been filled back to capacity. It does get pretty damn cold here somedays... Best Deep Dish Pizza in Ann Arbor New infill Just a zoning mess. I don't think these will be around much longer. View from the parking structure above during warmer weather: Left, Zaragon Development. Right U of M's East Quad. Notice that students must walk past businesses to get to campus. Again it's that mix of buildings that some love or hate. The recently completed home for Ross School of Business. A $100 million gift to the University The Law Quad. Built in the 1920's The Law Quad will soon have a new building across the street. Financed through gifts and donations: Source UM AEC PLANT EXTENSION The Law Library Let's go inside: If the Law Quad is too quiet for you, there's always the Grad Library across the street. Shown here is the 2nd floor reading room with murals from the Chicago Colombian Exposition in the 1890's. In my 6 years at U of M, I have studied in neither of these libraries sadly. View looking back toward South U. from U of M's Ford School of Public policy, another donated building completed in 2007. Stayed tuned for downtown and more of the University of Michigan

I agree they look cheap, but it's HOPE VI, you can't expect too much architectural greatness out of this. I'd consider this development average. Check out Chicago's. They are rowhomes constructed of enormous bright red bricks with very utilitarian stoops. That's the Chicago adaptation, the above shows the attempt at a Springfield adaptation. I think the best I've seen is Philly's, yet it's still vinyl windows and false brick built to be faux historical. But they got the scaling, proportion, setback, and materiality correct. Damn, that's the second time I hit modify instead of quote. Sorry Motorist. Somebody can smack me upside the head.

The snow and building colors look beautiful in those photos.

Almost as good as my floating convention hall idea! No, but seriously this is kind of cool if you get tired of your house looking the same, just slide for a new space/layout.

Awesome. They really don't build these like they used to.

LOL, MCS makes a guest appearance. This video. So True... The video looks to be about 4 years old since a bunch of highrise buildings in this video were recently dropped.

This new technology is pretty exciting. It has very little negative impacts on environment, and we don't have to put up with looking at its ugliness like wind power. Since most of our cities are on the water, perhaps this may be a very important player in energy technology of the future. Best of all, it's cheap! And could be ready for production in just a few years. http://www.freep.com/article/20090113/NEWS05/901130324?imw=Y

Thanks for finding that. I had no idea a hardware store was there. I knew there was a sushi restaurant but I guess both are in the same building. I'll take a walk down there tomorrow. I suppose it takes a buckeye to help a wolverine around his own town lol. Beet Juice sounds like something Michigan needs to adopt. We are always having salt shortages and we are a huge produce of sugar beets. Sounds like a perfect combination.

So here I sit in the heart of wonderful urban Ann Arbor, MI. A city with 115,000 people and restaurants from practically every country in the world. 3 whole foods stores, 2 trader joes, 1 great urban market, and of course your obligatory 4 starbucks within a 6 block radius. I need a snow shovel. But I cannot obtain said item here in the city because the local hardware stores have been replaced by micro breweries or hookah shops. Basic needs crisis. Now I have to take the bus out to the suburbs to Home depot just so I can bring back the shovel and liberate my car from the streets Ann Arbor chooses not to clear.....because salting is not environmentally friendly!!! :whip: :whip: :whip: :whip: :whip: :whip: :whip: :whip:

Agreed. I think it's okay to have some setback once and awhile. For example, the zero setback in Philly gets monotonous eventually. Concrete really begins to dominate and there is not enough room to grow things except for some scrawny little trees. I actually like Chicago's setbacks up in Lincoln Park. Just 6-8 feet makes a huge difference, and some of the trees have become massive.

That's really sad. I've seen situations where hospitals located in poorer areas have bought up the neighborhood and have instead renovated the homes and provided them for young professionals and doctors working at the hospital. Some houses are quite large like a few pictured above, so the hospital hires a management company to maintain the properties since doctors are obviously busy. Shame this didn't go the same route.

You know, the only REAL rowhouses I ever saw in Michigan were in a town called Calumet. It's located 10 hours north of Detroit in the upper peninsula. The terrain is mountainous and they had a mining boom up there about 80 years ago. This means they had to build dense and a few nice brick rows were built. The Houghton-Hancock-Calumet area has a lot more in common with Pittsburgh or Cincinnati than any city in Michigan. It's also really the only urbanized area they have up there. Their tallest building is like 13 floors or something.

Yeah EGR really tends to be overlooked. I saw it for the first time last year and loved it. I haven't experienced too many of GR surrounding suburbs with the exception of Wyoming, which I couldn't believe how monstrous it was. BTW the GR Catholic Central's new office building is awesome. They basically took this bombed out warehouse, took off the collapsing facade and brought it into the 21st century. It looks really nice and very contemporary. The parking garage has cables that will allow ivy to grow up the side giving it green walls. I know they plan to expand the square more in the future, so it should be cool to see how it eventually turns out. Another renovation has been announced recently. I can't remember the name of the building, it's at the top of Monroe near the police station. 5 or 6 story wedge shaped building. Excellent views. I wasn't able to make it out to GR Friday because of bad weather. Hopefully it will clear up soon and I'll make the trip.

I wonder if this will help independent retailers (what's left). I do feel bad for all the employees that will be laid off though. No one wants that. And while I could give a crap about the big boxes out in the suburbs, circuit city operated quite a few great urban stores. My favorites were the one just off the 3rd Street Promenade in Santa Monica that was like 3 or 4 floors, and the one in the old renovated factory building on Chicago's North Ave. Great buildings now empty. However, Never liked the layout or presentation of product at circuit city. The checkout area was confusing, poor lighting, layout was hardly logical. Best Buy really had it nailed down in all areas. Circuit city was really going the route of CompUSA. They needed to update and be more like their competitors...err...competitor.. It really must be a Minneapolis thing. Both Best Buy and Target seem to follow similar models, providing discount products in a seemingly 'upscale' setting.' I just hope Best Buy doesn't become too arrogant. Now becoming the only national retailer of electronics, I hope they can take this opportunity to up their service even more. I'll admit, I've gotten pretty good help with the geek squad and they've bailed some of my friends out of very difficult technical predicaments. Their salespeople have also been pretty knowledgeable. I'm sure people here will say the opposite, but considering their the last giant retailer standing, it makes complete sense.

Hayward also showed you a bunch of ruined rowhouses in Detroit in general.

Ooo, look at the classy under the window air conditioner grates. Yeah a bit flat.