Book Review: “Breaking Gridlock: Moving Toward Transportation That Works.”

J&A helps develop the New San Marco Apartments in Duluth, Minnesota

Dawoud Bey and Chadsey High School at the Detroit Institute of Arts

Create Detroit Up and Running

Book Review: “Breaking Gridlock: Moving Toward Transportation That Works.”

On a four-hour train ride from Detroit to Chicago, I finally got around to reading “Breaking Gridlock: Moving Toward Transportation That Works,” a review of sensible transportation systems around the world that was written by Jim Motavalli an automotive and transportation writer for Saon.com and the New Times and other publications. The book takes on the conventional wisdom that the only real effective form of transportation is the automobile.

Motavalli is not a knee jerk car-hater, though he is not a big fan of SUVs either (“two thumbs down”). Instead, he looks at all forms of transportation including fuel-cell cars, tele-commuting, bikes, boats, buses, trains and even airplanes. For a native Detroiter slightly obsessed with mass transit, it was a fun look at some of the possibilities, most of which are put into action by forward thinking communities around the world.

He reviews some of the more transit-invested regions including Boston, New York, Portland, Los Angeles and Arcata, a small northern California town struggling to encourage buses and bikes. The discussion on Los Angeles was particularly noteworthy for the intersection between transit and civil rights. The city and county, which had invested heavily in light rail, faced some criticism from civil rights groups for ignoring a bus system that carries more people and more minorities on a daily basis.

In Detroit and Michigan, the economic future has been tied to the development of fuel-cell technology so I read the chapter with great interest. According to Motavalli, beyond building a hydrogen-powered car, the process of extracting liquefied hydrogen is difficult and expensive. Clearly, the better alternative, at least in the near future, is hybrid electric cars, which are now proving to be a hot seller in some communities.

Motavalli veers off to talk about highly successful light rail systems particularly in Europe and Japan. He contrasts the experience overseas with our struggle to keep Amtrak functioning. His discussion on rail is both enlightening and infuriating. As he says in Chapter Five, “Europe and America: Different Road Taken, “perhaps more than anywhere else in the world, Europe is putting the car in its place, refusing to let it dominate the development process and overshadow other forms of transit. The results are dramatic.” As an example, he points to Zurich, Switzerland where 76 percent of the rush hour commutes are via mass transit.

The book is written in clear journalistic prose, Motavalli’s newspaper background is evident in his simple, to the point style. Unlike some works based in academic research, heavy in statistics and theory, Motavalli relies on first hand accounts of the transportation systems, almost always his own. He rides the transit systems, the cars and buses and recounts his experience, peppering it with interviews with transit managers, scientists and advocates.

He finishes the book with a set of recommendations that are more pep talk, “Don’t build out of congestion,” “Drive smart,” than actual policy recommendation, but that’s ok. While not digging too deep into the mundane policy and politics of transportation, Motavalli smartly shows us what good transportation infrastructure does for a community and what it looks like. Be it the high speed rail, or even the ferrys in Seattle, he makes a poignant case to take a look at the road we are on and maybe take one less traveled.

I would suggest that if you ever have a few hours on a plane, train, bus or even an automobile, you read “Breaking Gridlock.” As we continue our discussions on place and the importance of livability, we need to be taking a different approach to our transportation investments. “Breaking Gridlock,” is a great place to look to see what can be done.

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J&A helps develop the New San Marco Apartments in Duluth, Minnesota

At any point in time, dozens of men and women with chemical dependency problems reside in shelters, halfway houses, abandoned buildings, and vacant lots in and around Duluth’s downtown neighborhood. Their dependency issues cause them to be ill housed, malnourished, and vulnerable to physical and emotional exploitation. They make use of community services such as Duluth police intervention, the Detox Center, mental health and emergency social services and hospital emergency rooms on a regular basis.

Center City Housing Corporation (CCHC) is a Minnesota 501 (c)(3) nonprofit corporation dedicated to the provision of safe and affordable housing for Duluth’s very low and moderate income families and individuals, is poised to offer an alternative housing option.

CCHC is seeking to develop 30 permanent supportive domiciliary (GRH) housing units for chemically dependent individuals living in and around downtown Duluth and 40 units of supportive efficiency units for individuals with a history of mental illness and/or homelessness.

The New San Marco Apartments will seek to bring housing and supportive services under one roof to overcome the cause of persistent homelessness, combining the efforts of Center for Alcohol and Drug Treatment (CADT), Human Development Center (HDC), and Churches United in Ministry (CHUM). These agencies are key providers of services ranging from shelter, social services and advocacy, mental health and alcohol and chemical dependency recovery for low-income, and/or homeless individuals in Duluth.

The new building will occupy a site being acquired by the City of Duluth through eminent domain after having tried, in vain, to negotiate a purchase. The land will then be donated the project. The existing structures will be demolished to accommodate the proposed new development, which will be approximately 45,000 square feet and is projected to cost $8 million in total development costs.

The project will seek Low Income Housing Tax Credits (LIHTC) allocated by the Minnesota Housing Finance Agency in its July 22, 2004 Round. Additional resources are being provided by the City of Duluth to acquire the site and demolish the buildings. The project has secured a $400,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Supportive Housing Program (SHP) and will seek funds from the MHFA’s Housing Trust Fund and Special Programs for the Homeless as well as the Federal Home Loan Bank (FHLB) and philanthropic sources.

The services and programs provided on site and within the envelope of the building will directly support the tenancies of all residents. In the case of the support services for GRH residents, the Center on Alcohol and Drug Treatment will provide residents with health and security needs, serve meals and offer connection to social services, on a 24-hour basis. Operating support for the services will be provided by St. Louis County’s Group Residential Housing (GRH) reimbursement.

The 40 residents living in the efficiency units will also have access to food service, social service referral and community activities on site. An additional benefit is proximity to the Supportive housing staff and units. The New San Marco Apartments will provide an environment that may help stabilize tenancies for people with chemical dependency problems by providing greater options than exist in Duluth market.

The New San Marco Apartments embodies an opportunity to accomplish several community objectives. The project will target households experiencing long-term homelessness and will provide housing for individuals at or below 30% of Area Median Income and using HUD’s 30% of income rent limits, in addition to the supportive services so critical to this population.

If Minnesota grants the needed Tax Credits it will be public monies well allocated. Good Luck CCHC.

Development Team
Developer Center City Housing Corp.
Development Consultant Juergensen & Associates
Architect/Engineer LHB Corporation
Attorney William Burns
General Contractor To Be Selected

Partners
Supportive Services Center for Alcohol and Drug Treatment (CADT)
Human Development Center (HDC)
Churches United in Ministry (CHUM)

Predevelopment & Financing

Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC) –

Duluth Office Corporation for Supportive Housing (CSH) – Minnesota Office Housing & Redevelopment Authority of Duluth
City of Duluth

Department of Housing & Urban Development

Dawoud Bey and Chadsey High School at the Detroit Institute of Arts

This might be your last chance to check out Dawoud Bey’s exhibit, “Dawoud Bey: Detroit Portraits,” at the Detroit Institute of Arts. The exhibit, which ends on August 1, was a collaborative effort with students from Chadsey High School. Dawoud worked at Chadsey High School for three months photographing students in classes at school. The students worked with Dawoud to write texts that accompanied that photographs, which are presented as fine portraits in large-scale format. The exhibit also includes four short videos of students.

Dawoud is particularly interested in urban areas and providing fine art portraiture to groups that have not typically been the subject of such work. He brings these underrepresented communities to the world of fine art, placing them “within the context of an art museum and on a scale comparable to paintings, his photographs transform a museum’s gallery from their traditional setting into a contemporary space where a more meaningful and relevant exchange between the institution and its community can occur.”

The exhibit is sponsored by the Michigan Council for the Arts and Cultural Affairs and the City of Detroit. “Dawoud Bey: Detroit Portraits,” runs through August 1, for more information please click on the link below.

Dawoud Bey: Detroit Portraits

Create Detroit Up and Running

Since the big Create Detroit event in March, organizers have been working furiously, volunteering their time to build Create Detroit into a sustainable movement that can have a positive impact on the city. We are proud to announce that Create Detroit has submitted its paperwork to the Internal Revenue Service and will soon become a certified 501(c)3 non-profit. Both Jay Juergensen and Mike Scholl from Juergensen & Associates are on the Board of Trustees and Jay will be serving on the Executive Board.

We are chairing the Public Policy and Government Relations work group. If you have any suggestions or examples of good regional policies, please let us know.

Additionally, we would like to thank Ann Slawnik and Karen Batchelor for all their hard work to bring the organization to fruition and Mark Bisard for his work in obtaining non-profits status.