This story focuses mostly on GR and growth on the west, northwest and southeast areas of the state, but still- it's a nice headline to see.
And it seems to me I remember the early 80's being like this, too, where the running CW in this area was that "half of Detroit is moving over here".
EDIT: 7:50 PM- WZZM failed to tell me this morning that this was a USA TODAY story. Link here.
GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. - The first JW Marriott luxury hotel in the Midwest and an art museum are under construction.
Developers are turning abandoned factories into luxury lofts and restaurants. Imposing medical centers are rising in a neighborhood called "Health Hill." Michigan State University, based in East Lansing about an hour to the east, plans to move its medical school here.
This growth and development frenzy is happening in an old furniture manufacturing center in a state that has had so many dismal economic developments in recent years it could have been dubbed the grim-news state.
Detroit, Michigan's most populous city, has shrunk by more than 50,000 people this decade to about 900,000. Its biggest industry, automobiles, has been battered by global competition.
But fresh county population estimates from the Census Bureau show modest turnarounds in several other parts of the state. Sixty of Michigan's 83 counties have grown this decade, and 19 had population gains of at least 5%.
"It's an industrial state in significant transition," says Keith Schneider, deputy director of the Michigan Land Use Institute.
So far, the gains have been concentrated in three regions:
•West. Counties including the cities of Muskegon, Holland, Grand Rapids and Kalamazoo are seeing modest to robust growth. A highway extension south of Grand Rapids, home of the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Museum, has opened neighboring counties to commuters. The Grand Rapids area is attracting medical investment and professionals.
"They're attractive, quality-of-life places and have a somewhat more diverse economic base," says John Austin, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and vice president of the Michigan State Board of Education. "It's close to Chicago."
•Southeast. Washtenaw County, home of Ann Arbor and the University of Michigan, is a center of research and development and biotech activity. It's a place "where there are educated people, where knowledge works," Austin says.
•Northwest. Traverse City and counties on the shores of Lake Michigan are benefiting from tourists and retirees moving in. Beaches and other natural attractions are luring entrepreneurs and executives who can work anywhere because of wealth and technology.
The words "single state recession" ring a bit hollow in the face of this, don't they?