Mike Duggan, mayor of Detroit | Wikimedia Commons (public domain); U.S. Department of Homeland Security
Mike Duggan, mayor of Detroit | Wikimedia Commons (public domain); U.S. Department of Homeland Security
The I-375 modernization project in Detroit has cleared a financial hurdle now that the State of Michigan has been awarded $105 million in grant funding to help move the project forward.
Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg and elected officials from Detroit assembled together recently to celebrate the State winning the competitive federal grant to fund the project.
"I'm ready to fill in the ditch called I-375 and make it a beautiful, bustling boulevard, connecting the city of Detroit," Mike Duggan, Detroit's mayor, said in a press release from the governor's office. "We all know the painful history of I-375, and the city's planning staff is having ongoing conversations with the community on how we're going to transform I-375 together. Today's announcement means we're going to be able to speed this project from 2027 to 2025, thanks to the city, state and federal government all working together. Let's fill in the ditch and re-knit this community."
The goal of the project is to turn the outdated I-375 freeway into an accessible boulevard, the release said. Officials believe it will help boost economic development and tie Detroit back together. The highway was built almost 60 years ago and split prominent Black communities. Earlier this year, Whitmer announced the project would move forward after the Michigan Department of Transportation (MDOT) finished an environmental review with input from the community.
Whitmer noted that the original highway construction displaced 130,000 Michiganders and hundreds of businesses.
"While we cannot change the past, we can work together to build a more just future, and that's exactly what today's grant empowers us to do," she said in the release.
Paul C. Ajegba, MDOT director, thanked Buttigieg and the U.S. Department of Transportation for acknowledging the project's value for the community.
"For several years, my team has been working hard to reinvent this corridor with the goal of acknowledging mistakes of the past, reconnecting neighborhoods and spurring economic growth," he said in the release.
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