A2, the Next Palm Springs?
Jo Mathis has the solution to A2’s sagging housing market: attract more retirees! “We need people moving to the area who don’t need the jobs that aren’t here,” she argues. For those who might be attracted to coastal retirement havens like Florida, she points out that Lake Michigan, which is only two and a half hours away, has no sharks.
I think that would work better for Detroit.
posted by Mark on March 20th, 2007 at 12:03 pmDoes the Detroit River have sharks?
posted by Jen on March 20th, 2007 at 1:35 pmYes, higher housing costs! We can just bus all the slave labor in.
posted by simplehiker on March 20th, 2007 at 4:42 pmAlread happening. Welfare to Work anyone?
posted by They Do on March 20th, 2007 at 5:41 pmPeople without kids in the local schools and on fixed incomes. Sweet!
posted by Anna on March 20th, 2007 at 6:15 pmA cousin once had a nasty encounter with a muskellunge
posted by toasty on March 21st, 2007 at 3:06 amMy favorite part of this article, though, is this quote:
posted by S on March 21st, 2007 at 6:59 am“There’s so … many old people down there.”
The ellipsis cracks me up; I can’t help wondering which unprintable word went there!
Maybe the guy that moved here from Midland was attracted by the Gelman Plume.
posted by Ypsidweller on March 21st, 2007 at 1:17 pmJokes aside, a lot of people who “retired” to Florida have been moving back up north and Ann Arbor’s relative density might actually be more liveable than other places in MI for folks who may not be able to drive…
posted by Scott T. on March 21st, 2007 at 3:41 pmI, too, moved here from Midland because the real estate was easily affordable on my executive salary, and also so I could be closer (via airport) to London and Rome.
Yes, the days of Ann Arbor’s hippiedom are loooong gone. Just what we need, a bunch of old ex-hippies moving in and complaining about how drunk and loud all the kids are after 9:00 pm.
posted by Dave on March 21st, 2007 at 4:06 pmMy wife claims that many retirees move twice: once in their sixties, to someplace warm like Florida or California, and again in their eighties (if still alive) to be near their children.
posted by David Cahill on March 22nd, 2007 at 7:47 amThat certainly happened with my husband’s grandparents.
posted by Chris on March 22nd, 2007 at 8:48 amAnn Arbor has one of the country’s best programs for mobility impaired and disabled people…the ARide. Seniors and disabled people pay $2 per trip and get picked up in a Yellow Cab and taken door to door. Our tax dollars at work!
So yes–disabled people and seniors actually move here, for this benefit.
posted by Carol Shepherd on March 22nd, 2007 at 11:16 amNo more old people please. They are one of the reasons people can’t have live amplified music in West Park anymore.
posted by Hater on March 23rd, 2007 at 3:10 pmOn some level, I understand the argument— Florida is a hellish swamp, and will be swallowed by the ocean around the time the last polar bear dies. For anyone who plans on living more than five years, Michigan is infinitely better.
posted by js on March 26th, 2007 at 12:03 amOn the other hand, I suspect that Jo Mathis is reaching a certain age, when she requires a cohort lest she venture to Angelo’s alone and be accosted by some drunken frat boy cruising for a “cougar.”
Ann Arbor would be a great place for those who retire, except for two things, also known as Russia’s greatest generals: January and February.
posted by Fredric Alan Maxwell on April 6th, 2007 at 12:23 pmThe old people don’t move to Florida so they can swim in the Atlantic or Gulf. They go for the warm weather and the zillions of retirement communities that have sprung up in the past 40 years down there; not to mention the fellowship of so many more octogenarians.
What Ann Arbor needs is what every city in the United States needs: more jobs and not all of them white collar. If it had this, it might have a chance.
posted by A-Squared Ex on May 1st, 2007 at 2:39 pm