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Detroit gave the world the moving assembly line, Motown and techno, and after decades of decline and a 2013 bankruptcy it has become one of the more compelling American cities to visit. Downtown and Midtown have been substantially rebuilt, while whole districts elsewhere remain thinly populated, and the contrast is part of what makes the place interesting.
The cultural holdings are world class. The Detroit Institute of Arts contains Diego Rivera's Detroit Industry Murals, painted on site in 1932 and among the finest frescoes in North America. The Motown Museum occupies Hitsville U.S.A., the actual house where Studio A produced the hits, and the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn is one of the great collections of American industrial history.
Eastern Market runs the largest historic public market district in the US, Corktown around Michigan Central Station is the restaurant and bar quarter, and the Detroit RiverWalk faces Windsor, Ontario, which sits directly south across the water, the only place in America where you look south into Canada.
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June to September is comfortably the best window, when the RiverWalk, Eastern Market and the festival calendar are all in full swing, including Movement, the electronic music festival, over Memorial Day weekend. September and early October bring crisp air and colour. Winter is genuinely cold and snowy with short days, though hotel rates drop sharply and the museums are all indoors.
Detroit Metropolitan is 30 km southwest of downtown, so a taxi or rideshare takes around 30 minutes and is what most visitors use. The FAST Michigan bus runs to downtown for a few dollars but takes about an hour. Renting a car is worth considering, as Detroit is a spread-out city built around driving and several key sights, including the Henry Ford in Dearborn, sit outside the centre.
The areas visitors actually go, Downtown, Midtown, Corktown, Eastern Market and the RiverWalk, are well populated, patrolled and comfortable, and Detroit's reputation lags well behind its current reality in these districts. Crime remains concentrated in specific residential neighbourhoods away from the centre. Practical advice: use rideshare rather than walking long distances between districts at night, park in staffed lots, and skip the urban-exploration trend of entering abandoned buildings, which is both illegal and genuinely dangerous.
The Detroit Institute of Arts is the single must-see, above all for Diego Rivera's Detroit Industry Murals. The Motown Museum at Hitsville U.S.A. is small but moving, and tickets should be booked ahead. The Henry Ford Museum and Greenfield Village in Dearborn need most of a day. Add Eastern Market on a Saturday, the Guardian Building's art deco lobby, and the Detroit RiverWalk for views across to Canada.
Yes, Windsor, Ontario sits directly across the river and is reached in minutes via the Detroit-Windsor Tunnel or the Ambassador Bridge. Bring your passport, as this is a full international border with the usual checks in both directions, and queues can be long at peak times. Windsor gives the novelty of looking north at the Detroit skyline from Canada, and its riverfront park has the better view of the city.
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