I timed myself and it took me a minute and 21 seconds to scroll throughthe images of Detroit's blight. Initially, I didn't even read any of the analysis that The New York Times provided, I just scrolled.
The Times has done several interactive pieces on blight in Detroit. There's been a wealth of data since the Detroit Blight Removal Task Force Plan was published.
This one really makes you realize how vast the city's housing problem actually is.
Their analysis breaks blight up geographically with different anecdotes and facts. Here are two examples:
7 Mile Road:
While most of the properties on the foreclosure list were residential, about 5 percent were sites of former businesses, of which a majority were vacant lots or unoccupied structures. Many were formerly gas stations, auto body shops and car washes.
Lenox Street:
Ronald Ford Jr. says he has struggled to find work as a laborer and to pay his bills, let alone the $7,000 in property taxes that he now owes. His family bought the house in 1969, and his mother made the final mortgage payment years ago. But he said they stopped paying the taxes after she grew ill and moved into a nursing facility.
-- Lucy Perkins, Michigan Radio Newsroom
