Grosse Pointe Park adds large planters at border with Detroit

The saga of the Detroit-Grosse Pointe Park border on Kercheval Avenue just got a little stranger this week. On Tuesday, July 14, MLive reported that city of Grosse Pointe Park has added large planters to the area that has been reconfigured multiple times over the last year in ways that restrict Detroiters’ access to Grosse Pointe Park’s Kercheval business district.
 
A Grosse Pointe Park city official told MLive that the planters were nothing more than a beautification project.
 
Last year, Grosse Pointe Park erected sheds for its farmers market in the middle of Kercheval, blocking all vehicular traffic between that city and Detroit. The sheds were moved later in the year after an agreement was reached between Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan and the city of Grosse Pointe Park to re-open the thoroughfare connecting the two cities. Earlier this year, Grosse Pointe Park installed a roundabout at the border that only allows one-way traffic to enter from Detroit.
 
While the newly installed planters do not restrict vehicular access between the cities, they do create a visual barrier.
 
According to MLive’s Ian Thibodeau, “The nearly five-foot-tall planters Tuesday were being filled by a landscaping company with rocks, soil and trees. They were too heavy to move by hand, arranged along the Grosse Pointe Park border in a straight line. Several smaller planters were being placed, too. They were big enough that two landscaping workers could sit inside the planter to arrange the trees.”
 
Metromode recently has been covering border dynamics in metro Detroit in its “Life on the Border” series. Read our feature on Detroit and Grosse Pointe Park here.
 
Read more: MLive