From Detroit's Resurgence to Denver's Future: Key Lessons from Urban Exploration
- Downtown Denver Partnership
- Sep 9
- 2 min read
Our recent Urban Exploration program took to the streets and spaces of Detroit, with more than 140 Denver-based leaders seeking to learn from those who have led the city’s historic renaissance. The program revealed powerful insights about urban transformation that are already shaping how we approach downtown revitalization efforts here in Denver. Over two and a half days, we witnessed firsthand how a city can rewrite its narrative through strategic investment, authentic pride, and collaborative action.
What Detroit Taught Us
The Power of Authentic Pride: Detroit's transformation centers on a fundamental shift in how the city sees itself. Community leaders refused to let outsiders define their narrative and instead became the loudest voices telling Detroit's story. When people are genuinely proud of their city, they protect it, invest in it, and invite others to experience it.
Strategic Collaborative Investment: Private sector leaders in Detroit invest far beyond their own properties, funding everything from world-class public spaces like Campus Martius Park to state-of-the-art safety coordination centers, homeless services, and public transportation. This ecosystem demonstrates that collective action creates transformative change.
Creating Downtown as a Gathering Place Detroit successfully leveraged its assets, including vibrant public spaces, to bring people back to the city's core. The result is a downtown where locals see themselves and visitors feel welcomed.
Applying These Lessons in Denver
Shifting the Narrative: The "I Choose Denver" movement emerged from the program, with participants committing to positive storytelling about our own downtown. The Downtown Denver Partnership is launching an initiative to convene organizations around unified marketing efforts, bringing together positive stories and community champions to shift perceptions.
Engaging Legacy Investors & Philanthropy: Following Detroit's model, we're collaborating with philanthropic organizations to identify alignment opportunities with new investors. These partnerships will help implement Downtown Area Plan priorities like establishing entrepreneurial pipelines, advancing small business support, and infusing play throughout downtown.
Strengthening Our Gathering Places: We're now rethinking 16th Street activation, exploring innovative services like drop-in childcare at playgrounds, and advancing new approaches to event permitting and public space programming.
The Path Forward
Detroit's story proves that urban transformation requires bold investment, authentic identity, and unapologetic pride in telling your own story. The future of Downtown Denver depends on all of us embracing shared responsibility for its success. When we choose Denver - when we invest in it, celebrate it, and invite others to experience it - we create the conditions for authentic, sustainable transformation.
Our exploration proved that better is not just possible, it's inevitable when a community comes together with vision, resources, and genuine pride.
