Poletown's "Desolation Angel"

The cover story of this week's issue of the Metro Times, "Desolation Angel" by Detroitblogger John, is about a small church on Chene called Peacemakers International which has become a refuge for the poor, drug-addicted, and destitute in one of Detroit's roughest areas. It's a really great article and I would recommend reading it, but one specific reason I wanted to mention it is that Peacemakers International is located in Poletown, a few blocks south of I-94. I've written about Poletown a couple times recently, specifically about how the neighborhood slowly declined over several decades as a result of the same things that affected many neighborhoods: freeway construction, a general movement of population out of the city, and urban renewal (a highly publicized and controversial example of it, in Poletown's case).

Here's how the article describes the area's recent history:

"Chene Street is a disaster. The rows of burned-out storefronts between the empty blocks are reminders of how bustling it once was. But after the riot, after the freeway and an auto plant split the neighborhood in half, after everyone packed up and moved away, almost everything just died off.

Pouring into the void left behind were outcasts and cast-asides — junkies and drunks, hookers and drug dealers, the mentally ill and the physically disabled. Like a few other areas of the city, it became a refuge of the underclass, a home for everyone with nowhere else to go, where they can wander freely without being chased away by store owners, or told to move along by the cops."

Peacemakers International, at the corner of Chene and Frederick. (Image from Google Maps)