Detroit Riverfront Featured in New Brownfield Flip Video

Brownfield Flip video series - Detroit Riverfront
Transform your community with help from the MDEQ

The Michigan Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ) released the sixth in a series of videos showcasing its brownfield redevelopment projects. Brownfields are properties that are known or believed to be contaminated. The MDEQ helps communities clean up and safely reuse brownfields with financial incentives and technical assistance.

This new Brownfield Flip video shows the ongoing transformation of the Detroit Riverfront from industrial blight to public use. By the early 2000s much of Detroit’s formerly active industrial riverfront was abandoned. Parking lots and vacant buildings blocked public access to the river. Detroit’s renaissance would be incomplete without opening the downtown riverfront for public access and events. The city would need to demolish vacant industrial sites, relocate cement silos, and redevelop vacant riverfront property.

Unprecedented state, local, and citizen collaboration turned the Detroit riverfront from a blighted industrial corridor to a vibrant public space. Ten years after the MDEQ demolished cement silos on the river and awarded a transformative $7.2 million in grants for environmental cleanup and riverfront infrastructure, the Detroit riverfront is now the jewel of Detroit’s renaissance and a symbol of residents’ pride and involvement in their city. 

Each video in this series will feature a different brownfield redevelopment which has transformed communities, created neighborhood destinations, or resulted in recreational opportunities. 

For more information about MDEQ brownfield redevelopment incentives, visit www.michigan.gov/deqbrownfields or contact the Brownfield Redevelopment Unit at 517-284-5113.   

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