[Gile]

I have a car, but being from NYC/DC I hate using it.

I'm moving from DC to Southfield Michigan for an internship in the fall, and don't mind commuting to work by car.

However, I'd really like to live in an area that is walkable and/or has close access to public transportation (metro/subway preferred over bus).

When asking people in DC about Detroit, they tell me that people without cars die off quickly. Is this true? Are there ANY walkable neighborhoods?

Please help!

[khfar]

There is no subway or train system in Detroit, so unless you want to take the bus, you will need a car!

[Paddington]

Detroit without a car. LOLOL. Especially Southfield at that.

Good luck with your crusade.

[cardwellave]

Yeah no kidding. If you want a place that you can walk to your grocery and things, maybe Royal Oak or Ferndale. Ferndale would be reasonably close for a commute. Southfield is realllllly suburbia. Detroit = need for a car. No way around it.

[Dexterguy]

The only somewhat walkable cities and neighborhoods that I can think of would be the City of Hamtramck (surrounded by Detroit), you can take the bus I believe into Downtown and else where. And Downtown Detroit has also become more walkable in recent years, with real solid sidewalks. And the Midtown neighborhood of Detroit where it is easy to get onto a bus.

Southfield, forget it!! No public trans. at all. Detroit and it's suburbs are very disattached transportation wise.

[randomguymike]

The good news is there's (another) proposal for a light rail alon woodward from 8 mile on in to FoxTown.

The bad news is, earliest we'll see it is 2013.

[electric_lady]

You need a car. Bottom line. You could take the bus, but our bus system is not the best. I have heard they are very rarely anywhere near to being on time and sometimes have pretty wacky schedules. Actually, a guy who was a passenger on a SMART bus just got run over today, so I'd avoid them in general.
Anyway, this is the Motor City. Which means any sort of mass transit would have been harmful to the auto industry.

[Bluefly]

Hahahahaha - Detroit without a car. Like the ocean without nasty salt water.

I lived in DC and grew up in metro Detroit. Kiss the good life goodbye, my friend. No more vibrant human-based culture pulsing everywhere. No more natural exercise built into your daily life. No more beautiful subway wisking you everywhere you want to go and spurring the creation of entire new and vibrant cities everywhere it goes. Oh no, such an incubator of investment would be socialism incarnate according to Michiganians.

You want to walk? Get on a treadmill after you spend your day driving from your house to your office to your lunch place to your gym to your house.

It's sad, really. The region just threw itself wholeheartedly into the automobile - plowing highways everywhere it could - and is now losing not only an industry but also a lifestyle built upon that industry. New generations don't want suburbia, and regions like DC are on the new frontier and lapping up all the big money.

That said - if you live downtown Detroit, there's a themepark type of elevated rail (which was the compromise allowed by the auto industry the last time anyone tried to build transit in Detroit). Royal Oak, Ferndale, Birmingham, and perhaps Pontiac have the same feel as DC's subway cities.

[Cherry]

I live in Hamtramck and rarely drive. Everything I need is within walking distance. The city is known for restaurants, bars, festivals, immigrants, and ethnic grocery stores. SMART buses have bike racks, so it's possible to ride a bicycle to Highland Park, and then take the bus to Southfield, with a transfer at the Fairgrounds. At least 4 DDOT bus routes come through Hamtramck, including one to Belle Isle and another that runs Downtown frequently and late at night.