XBradTC

Actually, the count for Detroit should start either in 1967 (riots put down by the National Guard) or 1974 (when Coleman Young was elected mayor-for-life), giving the city until 2032 or 2039 to try to mimic Hiroshima.

From Wikipedia:
Young himself explained the impact of the riots in his autobiography:

The heaviest casualty, however, was the city. Detroit’s losses went a hell of a lot deeper than the immediate toll of lives and buildings. The riot put Detroit on the fast track to economic desolation, mugging the city and making off with incalculable value in jobs, earnings taxes, corporate taxes, retail dollars, sales taxes, mortgages, interest, property taxes, development dollars, investment dollars, tourism dollars, and plain damn money. The money was carried out in the pockets of the businesses and the white people who fled as fast as they could. The white exodus from Detroit had been prodigiously steady prior to the riot, totally twenty-two thousand in 1966, but afterwards it was frantic. In 1967, with less than half the year remaining after the summer explosion—the outward population migration reached sixty-seven thousand. In 1968 the figure hit eighty-thousand, followed by forty-six thousand in 1969.

My own family left in 1971 for the suburbs. After college, I tried to enjoy the city, but it was just done. No jobs, no safety, limited nightlife. Of course, having a single party from 1974 onward led to far greater corruption and incompetence, plus scandal and profligate spending. Kwame Kilpatrick lived like the King of Siam, not the mayor of a city collapsing about itself. I’ve thought about buying land in Detroit, since it should come back some day, but who can wait 65 years?

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The road to Hell is indeed paved in good intentions.

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I am sure with a few billions more in tax dollars it will all be fine.

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