Get ready to grin, Detroit.
In announcing more detailed plans to develop $500 million worth of public and private investment in the city riverfront, Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick said Tuesday that one of the Boblo boats, the Columbia, could be put back into service as a river cruise boat.
For more than 75 years, the Boblo boats ferried passengers from the city to the former Boblo Island amusement park. The boat service ended in 1993.
At a press event attended by GlobeSt.com, city officials announced Tuesday that the three-mile east riverfront portion of the RiverWalk park is on schedule for completion by the end of 2006, and large sections could be finished in time for the Super Bowl in the city that year.
The state is building one of Michigan's first urban state parks called the Tri-Centennial State Park and Harbor. It is to be completed at the end of May and will allow the largest sailboats and recreational power boats to dock in a refit harbor.
General Motors Corp. is building a plaza along the river at the foot of the automaker's world headquarters in the city's signature building, the Renaissance Center.
The Kresge Foundation has committed $50 million toward the project.
"There is real money and real people sitting down at the table saying, 'Let's get this done'" Kilpatrick said.
GM economic development executive Matt Cullen, co-chairman of the conservancy, said the riverfront park could spur up to $2 billion in private investment behind the riverfront park, dominated by vacant lots and empty buildings. That development would include residential, commercial and office buildings.
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