破产后，底特律路在何方？

    2009年,在地方政府的资助下，通用汽车(General Motors)和克莱斯勒(Chrysler)迅速走出了破产，速度之快创下了新纪录。等到协商最终细节时(也就是几周时间)，通用汽车以及一定程度上克莱斯勒的未来似乎已经有了保证。两家公司精简员工、经销商、品牌和缩减债务后翻开了新的一页。很快，它们的成本结构变得有竞争力了。基础工程和设计能力保持完好，两家公司都稳步走上了成功之路。

    底特律市要走出破产所需要的时间可能会长得多（专家们表示，可能要一年半，甚至更久)，而且也更麻烦。城市退休工人正在为养老金和医保吵个不休，而地方政客们将权力和特权交给了银行家和债权人。更糟糕的是，所有这些痛苦不一定能换来未来的好日子。事实是底特律市破产后的未来似乎并不比破产前更光明。迄今为止，没人能对底特律的经济前景给出任何繁荣预期，哪怕是最轻度的繁荣。

    自从1967年骚乱导致几十人死亡以来，底特律已经多次试图重振经济，再现二战后美国汽车城的繁荣。这些重振计划初衷很好，也得到了大量的资金支持。 但没有一个能阻止底特律工业滑坡、政府失灵以及人口缩减等消极趋势。如今，底特律的市中心已经不怎么有吸引力了，大量年久失修或废弃的房屋、工厂和空地从三面包围了市中心(第四面是底特律河)。总体上，底特律有20平方英里的闲置土地，规模与整个曼哈顿相当。没有足够的游客和通勤上班族，纳税人口锐减，这些都难以抵消底特律正在逐步演变成鬼城的印象。

    市里各处仍有一些活动，有些甚至还很热闹，比如韦恩州立大学(Wayne State University)和底特律医药中心(Detroit Medical Center)。但它们也只是在努力挣扎，希望不要被周围的萧条所吞噬。破产只会让情况更糟。随着底特律裁减雇员，缩减治安环卫等基础服务，这些社区的活力也会遭到削弱。财务亏空的痼疾就像浓雾一样笼罩了这个城市。一方面稳住债权人，另一方面寻找新的收入来源，这个过程一拖再拖，怎么也没法让人联想到积极的经济、社会环境。

    但是即便是在底特律走出破产后，又能怎么样？这些年来，有过很多振兴底特律的想法和计划，比如亨利•福特二世1977年决定在底特律河岸边建造复兴中心（Renaissance Center）。这个不被看好的中心包含写字楼、酒店和零售商铺，但它吸引不到租户、购物者和游客，1996年只好低价卖给了通用汽车公司（General Motors）。

    乐观主义者会举出抵押贷款公司Quicken Loans的创始人丹•吉尔伯特的例子。过去几年，他已购入底特律市中心15栋建筑，将自己的7,000名雇员迁入其中。吉尔伯特的设想是在市中心低价购入的建筑中打造一个科技社区，吸引工程师、软件设计师和创业者入驻。但是如果吉尔伯特要将他的想法从慈善变成投资，还需要更多的人来填满这些空间，而不只是他的员工。任何人只要在下午5点后去底特律空旷的城市街道上走走，就知道这会有多么困难。

    Speed records were set in 2009 when General Motors (GM) and Chrysler zipped through government-sponsored bankruptcies. By the time the final details were negotiated—a matter of weeks—the future of GM, and to a lesser degree Chrysler, seemed assured. With fewer employees, dealers, brands, and debt, both companies got a fresh lease on life. In a stroke, their cost structures had been made competitive and, with their basic engineering and design skills intact, both were launched solidly on the road to success.

    Getting the city of Detroit through bankruptcy will take far longer – experts say a year and a half or more – and be far messier, as retired city workers fight over pensions and health care while local politicians cede power and privileges to bankers and creditors. What's worse is the lack of any future benefit from all the pain. As it stands, the post-bankruptcy future of Detroit looks no brighter than its immediate past. So far, no one has presented an economic vision for a prosperous Detroit that seems remotely doable.

    Since the 1967 riots that left dozens dead, there have been several well-intentioned and solidly financed efforts to lift Detroit back to its post-World War II prosperity as America's Motor City. Yet none has been enough to stem the counter-forces of industrial decline, dysfunctional government, and depopulation. Today, the city of Detroit features a moderately attractive downtown that is surrounded in three directions by acres of decrepit or abandoned housing, abandoned factories, and empty lots (on the fourth side is the Detroit River). In all, Detroit has 20 square miles of vacant land, roughly equal in size to Manhattan. There simply aren't enough visitors or commuters, much less tax-paying citizens, to blunt the perception that Detroit is on the way to becoming a ghost town.

    Here and there, clumps of activity, such as Wayne State University and the Detroit Medical Center, remain and even thrive, but they struggle to push back against the blight that surrounds them. Bankruptcy will only make things worse. The vitality of these neighborhoods will deteriorate as the city lays off employees and retreats further from essential services like police protection and garbage pickup. The malaise of financial distress envelopes the city like a thick fog. The protracted process of stiffing creditors on the one hand and scratching for new sources of revenue on the other is not going to be anyone's idea of a positive economic or social environment.

    But even after Detroit emerges from bankruptcy, then what? Various ideas and schemes have been floated to revive the city, such as when Henry Ford II built the Renaissance Center on the banks of the Detroit River in 1977. Ill-conceived, the complex of office, hotel and retail space failed to attract tenants, shoppers, or tourists, and was subsequently sold at a bargain price to General Motors in 1996.

    Optimists like to point to the energy and vision of Dan Gilbert, founder of mortgage provider Quicken Loans, who has bought 15 downtown buildings over the past few years and moved 7,000 of his employees into them. Gilbert's vision is for a kind of techno-community, built on a foundation of cheap real estate in trendy, gritty downtown neighborhoods, and populated by engineers, software designers, and entrepreneurs. But what Gilbert needs to move his activities from the philanthropy column into the investment category is more people who aren't on his payroll to fill all that empty space. One need only venture out on a deserted city street after 5 p.m. to see what a struggle that will be.