BORDER CITIES IN SPOTLIGHT
TVO episode on Windsor-Detroit urban renewal
Paris. Bangkok. Tokyo. Copenhagen. Over the past year, the TVO documentary series The LifeSized City has been spotlighting citizen-led urban revitalization efforts in communities around the world — and now it’s DetroitWindsor’s turn.
Shot locally over a few days this past summer, the Detroit-Windsor episode of the show’s second season will have its broadcast premiere Dec. 2.
“What makes a city better for the people who actually live there? It’s about how we shape cities, but also how cities shape us in return,” said Michel Lam, who directed the Detroit-Windsor episode of The Life-Sized City.
“We are searching for things that people do to make a city better, and more adapted to its citizens.” Lam said the majority of the shooting was done in June of this year, but the crew returned to Windsor in September to document a Ford City street festival and the Downtown Windsor Farmers Market.
Windsor is the smallest city yet to be featured on the program. Mikael Colville-Andersen, the show ’s host and an expert in urban design, said Detroit is the focus of the episode, but Detroit’s narrative and TVO’s mandate led the cameras to visit Windsor.
“It’s a parallel story,” ColvilleAndersen said. “Windsor represents all the smaller cities around the bigger cities around the world.” Lam said other reasons DetroitWindsor was chosen were the dual-nation character of the region and how both cities have been impacted by changes in the economy and industry. Colville-Andersen promised “loads of Windsor content” in the episode, such as an up-close look at a home-improvement project by the Little Things Matter community program run by the Downtown Windsor Community Collaborative.
“It was super friendly,” ColvilleAndersen marvelled about the experience. “People were stopping their cars in Detroit and coming over to us. And then somebody in Windsor drove past and shouted ‘Happy Saturday!’ ”
“I mean, the crew and I, who have travelled all over the world with this series and others, we were going, ‘People are just super friendly (here), in both cities.’ ” That’s not to say the show makers were blind to the negative issues of Windsor. Colville-Andersen noted the generational decline of the auto industry, the emptiness of the downtown area, and the increasing disconnection of the suburbs from the city’s core.
“To be honest — and you guys have heard this before — (Windsor) is not one of the places you think about first when you think about Canada,” he admitted. Asked if he encountered any Windsorites complaining about Windsor, Colville-Andersen replied: “Oh, sure. On many levels, the city kind of sucks, right? ... (Complaining) was a constant, absolutely.”
But Colville-Andersen feels those complaints were uttered with “good Canadian humour,” and he praised those who recognize Windsor’s issues while taking action to address them.
“The people we were interviewing, the citizens who are trying to make a change .... They have that can-do spirit of saying, ‘Yeah, the city sucks, man, but we’re going to make it better — and we can’t wait for the municipality.” Conspicuously missing from the episode: Any direct comment from Windsor’s mayor. Ward 4 Coun. Chris Holt was the only person involved in municipal government who the show producers chose to include.
Lam said the program’s intent is to bring attention to citizen-led efforts, rather than official channels. “We tend to talk to people who have direct links to projects on the ground .... It’s less about who’s elected and political visions on a large scale.”
Holt has arranged a community viewing party at the Walkerville business he co-owns, Chapter Two Brewing Company (2345 Edna St.), on Dec. 2. 19 and older. The episode airs at 8 p.m. Following television broadcast, all past episodes of The Life- Sized City can be viewed online at TVO. org.
What makes a city better for the people who actually live there? It’s about how we shape cities, but also how cities shape us in return.