Project Description
This article appeared in the June 2020 issue of ARCHITECT.
For more than a decade, Brooklyn, N.Y.–based Interboro Partners has made Detroit (and the socioeconomic challenges confronting it) a particular focus of its practice—so much so that the firm opened an office there. The fruits of those efforts are manifest in the Campau/Davison/Banglatown Neighborhood Framework Plan, a comprehensive vision for a troubled yet vital neighborhood north of downtown.
With a careful, community-focused approach, Interboro initiated in-depth conversations with a cross section of area residents, using, among other strategies for engagement, an ice-cream truck (see the cover) to cruise the neighborhood soliciting information and ideas from would-be customers—and rewarding them with free ice cream in return. The plan that emerged from this resourceful client-designer dialogue is at once bold and understated: Building on existing patterns of use, the team identified mechanisms to encourage the annexation of empty lots by adjacent homeowners. This both improves connections between major loci of activity and preserves key facilities currently in disrepair, effectively harnessing the informal urbanism long deployed by the community.
As elsewhere in Detroit, an exodus of residents and chronic underfunding of public services has obliged many locals to adapt, devising stopgap measures; Interboro’s scheme recognizes these ad hoc solutions, and supports them with new residential developments and infrastructure that reflect on-the-ground priorities. Favoring precision interventions and bottom-up thinking, Interboro has taken inspiration from Detroit residents’ vision and devised a methodology to help turn it into reality.
Project Credits
Project: Campau/Davison/Banglatown Neighborhood Framework Plan
Location: Detroit
Client: City of Detroit
Architect: Interboro Partners, Brooklyn, N.Y. and Detroit . Georgeen Theodore, AIA (principal-in-charge); Tobias Armborst, Daniel D’Oca (principals); Andrew Wald (director, Detroit Office/project manager); Katherine Isidro (associate); Chau Tran, Brian Mourato, Odili Onochie (designers); Diego Martin (intern)
Landscape Design: SmithGroup
Economic Development/Real Estate And Retail Market Analysis: BJH Advisors
Arts and community engagement: Liza Bielby
Size: 1 square mile (approx.)
Cost: Withheld
This project won a 2020 AIA Regional & Urban Design Awards.
FROM THE AIA:
Like many of Detroit’s neighborhoods, the Campau/Davison/Banglatown area has seen significant disinvestment and experienced radical depopulation. While it faces seemingly overwhelming challenges in the form of large tracts of vacant land, broken sidewalks, and unrepaired potholes, a closer inspection reveals innovative practices that eschew traditional narratives.
Campau/Davison/Banglatown represents one of the most diverse areas of Detroit, and large African-American and Polish communities have long called it home. Recent immigrants from Bangladesh and Yemen have further diversified it. The area boasts a bustling economic corridor and desirable neighborhoods where a growing number of artists, urban farmers, and entrepreneurs have taken up residence. Homes and businesses have begun to spread out, annexing vacant lots to serve regular needs—as lawns and driveways, for example—or develop something more strategic, such as a sprawling network of backyard gardens.
All of those factors have resulted in a quiet resurgence for the area and understanding the unique land-use patterns there required the team to spend time exploring and conversing with residents. For a year, the team leveraged communication and innovative engagement methods, such as an ice cream truck that traded scoops for participation, to build a feedback loop comprising the planners, the city, and the community.
This plan was driven by the community and includes strategies for improving the neighborhoods’ streetscapes, open space, housing, and economic development. Those priorities are synthesized into a holistic framework that identifies projects and improvements that can be implemented in the immediate future. Executed for a relatively modest fee, the plan highlights millions of dollars of potential investments.
Building on the creative practice the community has constructed, despite decades of disinvestment, the final plan outlines strategies to support and bolster existing community nodes in an effort to spur more social resilience in the area. Its key components include a “catalytic corridor” that better connects the eastern and western sections of the area, expanding the city’s Land Bank Authority program that allows residents to purchase vacant lots, and tactical preservation of a number of important structures.
This plan, one of a number initiated by Detroit’s progressive leadership to heal its relationship with residents, represents a roadmap for enhancing everyday life and strengthening neighborhoods. It has exceeded the city’s near-term objectives and set a new standard for what residents should expect from the planning process.
Project Credits:
Project: Campau/Davison/Banglatown Neighborhood Framework Plan
Architects: Interboro Partners
Landscape Architect: SmithGroup
Real Estate and Economic Development Advisor: BJH Advisors
Arts and Community Engagement: Liza Bielby