ZAP!

Could someone contribute a photo for comparison? I can't go see it in person seeing as how I'm all the way out here in Japan. (but for real I do want to see the progress)

I don't like being patronized, so I took the initiative to find every post from the pre-merge Amphitheater thread and organize them into a spreadsheet with permalinks and comment IDs. To save you the trouble of hunting them down. It includes all of pages 92 and 98-102, plus a few scattered others. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1-MhZeu3C2yycGo-bndk8DlcVSlsN8KlKz-CGcWjMJlw/edit?usp=sharing @GRDadof3 @Neo

The Amphitheater thread wasn't too long comparatively, was it? You could probably isolate its posts into a new thread, then re-merge all of the remaining Wealthy posts into this thread.

Didn't this thread used to be a lot longer? Like a lot longer? Did an oopsie happen in this move?

I'm curious what makes those triangles so hard to develop when other small, unusually-shaped properties have already been developed even in GR — like the "pizza slice" at Fulton & Ionia, which is around the same size. Birmingham (MI), by nature of its position along old Woodward, is replete with weird parcels, some of which have seen recent redevelopment amid their downtown revival. And if you look further to typical cities in Europe or Asia, most of the parcels there are irregular, small ones like this, and they seem to handle it fine.

If we're accepting wild speculation, I want a subway system. Maybe throw in some light rail and a legacy streetcar for flavor.

Amtrak operates at a loss almost everywhere. It ostensibly exists to provide a necessary service, not make big profits. Agree big time on GR to Detroit by rail though, especially passing through Lansing. It would make our train network actually work as a network, instead of the three disconnected services it is now

Probably for the secret subway that the local elites don't want us to know about. I did actually hear a guy say that we used to have a subway system in GR the other day. He didn't misspeak, he actually meant here. No idea where he got that idea from.

Seems like a good time to bring out my latest half-baked streetcar scheme: https://goo.gl/maps/4aFPiN7feYWor5uE6 I organized it into very very loose "stages" it could be built in. I tried to avoid impossible grades, and where plainly necessary added tunnels.

Found what I was most hoping for — several photos of the store. Thanks for the help, guys! From Sam Sherman's time: And just before it was demolished:

You fiend! My experience as a frequent pedestrian aligns with your guys' thoughts on this. The extra mental calculus in trying to read drivers' minds at all the intersections downtown where I used to be able to just wait for a signal is exhausting.

Based on absolutely no research, here's a map I drew of what canals could look like. https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer?mid=16MFOd82tBtssIaNXkNvRjv8z3jo7Vq0i I don't know why I just spent 20 minutes on this.

I know this is outside the normal subject of this thread, but it seemed like the most relevant place to ask. Does anyone here know about a neighborhood grocery store previously located at Highland and Lafayette? I'm interested in finding any info, but especially any photos or published records relating to it. I think it was at the northwest corner of the intersection (1075 Lafayette Ave SW), since that's the only grocery store-looking building I can see on Historic Aerials --- it's been replaced in the present day by a small apartment building. The store was run by Salim "Sam" Sherman, and would have closed sometime around the 50's or 60's. I ask on behalf of a senior relative whose grandfather ran it. Historic Aerials: Kent County Parcel Viewer: I can find some reference to a grocer operating out of the address in a 1921 business directory, but not Sam. It lends credence to the address at least.

A steam plant is an active urban use as far as I'm concerned — a city can't be all tasting rooms and boutique hotels. That said, the steam plant isn't only full of immobile equipment. It exists at the nexus of a massive, underground network of steam pipes that crisscrosses a huge swath of downtown, so I'd doubt if anything could reasonably be done to it. I'm no steam engineer, though.