Transcripts for CNN Anthony Bourdain Parts Unknown 20240604 04:56:15 archive.org - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from archive.org Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
the heart, the soul, the beat of an industrial, cultural superpower. a magnet for everyone with a dream of a better future, from eastern europe to the deep south. american dream, you came here. the one straight ahead with the green roof? yep, the big rococo building, completely empty. empty. unbelievable. the white one is being rehabbed. there s some money coming in. the one next to it on the right is completely empty. the gray pyramid with the spire on top sold for $5 million. $5 million for that? you can t buy a garage in the hamptons for that basically. $5 million for a skyscraper. it is post-apocalyptic. i mean, it s like a science fiction film. what the hell happened here? well, it is post-apocalyptic except for the fact that there s several hundred thousand people living here. detroit 2013. charlie leduff is a writer, journalist, television reporter. he grew up here. but it used to be two million people.
there are approximately 80,000 abandoned buildings within detroit s 140 square miles city limits. what that translates to, unfortunately, is about 14 acts of arson a day. nearly 5,000 a year. that s just arson. that doesn t include the thousands of other types of fires and medical emergencies the detroit fire department responds to every day. with an ever-lower valued housing market where you can buy a home for as little as $500, many houses are burned down for the insurance. many because angry neighbors desperate to hang on see abandoned structures taken over by crack heads or drug gangs. with law enforcement stretched ridiculously thin, they resort to burning them out.
that s the truth. abandoned. abandoned. man. but you have to admire the bold, proud, ferociously enterprising survivivors who decided to hang on, hang in, and figure out a way to not only survive, but do something extraordinary. there s tyree guyton s heidelberg project, a delightfully loony outdoor community art project that began in 1986 and now attracts 35,000 visitors per year from around the world. [engine starts] that was a buck in gas right there, just turning it on. ah, i love detroit. you know, they got this field mowed last summer, the neighborhood lit it on fire. another block and more decay. and a liquor store. for this neighborhood, the only store for miles. just be right back. how you doing? hey, lady.
ah, would love to have. kings and queens, every president wanted to ride in one. popes and. indian chiefs. a luxury car maker went out of business. little did they realize that was a trend that started here in detroit and when it affected detroit, it affected the entire world because it followed everybody home. it might have been 50 or 60 years later, but it started here and then everybody else experienced the same problem that we re having. in another 20 years, this place probably won t be here and people won t have any idea what went on over here. it s hard to look away from the ruin. to not find beauty in the decay. comparisons to angkor wat, macchu picchu, ancient rome, are inevitable. magnificent structures representing the boundless greens of the dead, left to rot. yet unlike angkor, and leptis magna, people still live here. we forget that.