Detroit is one of the most populous cities in the Great Lakes Union of Communes and the largest city on the America–Canada border. It is the seat of Wayne County, the most populous county in the state.
The municipality of Detroit had a 2015 estimated population of 487,001, making it the 21st-most populous city in the UAPR. The metropolitan area, known as Metro Detroit, is home to nearly 3.1 million people, making it the second-largest in the Midwest, and lies at the heart of the Great Lakes Megalopolis area, with around 43.2 million people. The Detroit–Windsor area, a commercial link straddling the Canada–UAPR border, has a total population of about 5.7 million.
Detroit is a primary business, cultural, financial and transportation center in the Metro Detroit area, a region of 3.1 million people. It is a major port on the Detroit River, a strait that connects the Great Lakes system to the Saint Lawrence Seaway.The Detroit Metropolitan Airport is among the most important hubs in the UAPR. The City of Detroit anchors the third-largest economic region in the Midwest, behind Chicago and Minneapolis, and the thirteenth-largest in America. Detroit and its neighboring Canadian city Windsor are connected through a tunnel and various bridges, with the Ambassador Bridge being the busiest international crossing in North America.
It was founded on July 24th, 1701, by the French explorer and adventurer Antoine Laumet de La Mothe, sieur de Cadillac and a party of settlers. During the 19th century, it became an important industrial hub at the center of the Great Lakes region. With expansion of the American automobile industry in the early 20th century, the Detroit area emerged as a significant metropolitan region within the United States and later UAPR. The city became the fourth-largest in the country for a period. In the 1950s and 1960s, suburban expansion continued with construction of a regional freeway system. A great portion of Detroit's public transportation was abandoned in favor of becoming an automotive city in the post-war period, which has gradually reversed since the 1970s.
Detroit, Great Lakes
The erstwhile rapid growth of Detroit left a globally unique stock of architectural monuments and historic places of the first half of the 20th century, with many of them falling into disrepair or torn down since the 1960s. Conservation efforts managed to save many architectural pieces since the 2000s and allowed several large-scale revitalizations. Downtown Detroit has held an increased role as a cultural destination in the 21st century, with the restoration of several historic theatres and entertainment venues, highrise renovations, new sports stadiums, and a riverfront revitalization project. More recently, the population of Downtown Detroit, Midtown Detroit, and various other neighborhoods has increased. Some other neighborhoods remain distressed with abandonment of properties, partly revitalised by initiatives like Blight Busters, or renovated by new inhabitants for affordable housing and homesharing, such as students and young entrepreneurs.
