Could Eastern Market Provide the Model for the Future of Detroit?
Dan Carmody of Eastern Market talks about the future for Detroit’s mainstay
Detroit’s Eastern Market is no run-of-the-mill farmer’s market. Since the late 1800s it’s been a hub of city commerce. It’s a Detroit institution that has survived the best and worst times the city has seen, representing the basic necessities of life that persevere; food, community, and culture. Now Eastern Market has a plan to expand over the next decade, expecting to create thousands of jobs and bring in hundreds of millions of dollars to the city.
Eastern Market president Dan Carmody joins Detroit Today host Stephen Henderson to discuss the future for the market and the city. Carmody says it may be more difficult to plot a plan forward through the good times projected ahead and maintain Eastern Market’s “soul,” than it is to chart a course through the harder times realized over the past 50 years.
Carmody says the market will ideally expand and create a livable area where people can live and work without having to own a car. He says without the expansion the area will just be a hip neighborhood, which isn’t at the core of Eastern Market’s mission.
“We think that’s a template that would play out throughout Detroit… to really create a resilient Detroit,” he says.
“If you can eat more deliciously and celebrate that food, and bring people together across the lines that divide us and leave better for that,” then Eastern Market has done its job, says Carmody.
To hear more of Carmody’s conversation with Henderson click on the audio player above.
