Detroit council nixes study on making the RenCen a historic district

• Detroit City Council says no to studying whether the iconic development should get historic designation 
• Plans call for making it part of an entertainment district akin to Chicago’s Navy Pier
• The lone holdout on the council argues that Detroit too often demolishes its own history

General Motors Co. says the Renaissance Center must evolve to survive. The Detroit City Council agreed, even if it means losing part of the iconic but underused riverside complex.

The City Council voted 8-1 on Tuesday to reject studying whether the Renaissance Center should become a historic district.

Historic designation, which the site was virtually guaranteed to qualify for, would make it much harder to carry out a $1.6 billion redevelopment plan outlined by GM and Dan Gilbert’s Rock Family of Companies.

Developers asked council members to spike the historic review last week, pledging that total demolition is off the table. Dave Massaron, vice president of infrastructure and corporate citizenship at GM, argued a historic designation would make it “impossible” for the largely vacant buildings to become useful again.

“The historic designation seeks to lock in the past,” Massaron said last week. “It doesn’t allow us to drive forward to a riverfront that can really be a magnet for all of us to enjoy together.”

He pitched a plan to give Detroit its own Navy Pier – a 21-acre world-class “family-friendly” entertainment district with affordable housing, retail options and a public promenade. To make it happen, two of the five towers would be demolished.

‘Only viable path’ for Renaissance Center 

Jared Fleisher, vice president of government affairs and economic development for Rock, said “this is the only viable path” to preserving the Renaissance Center.

Mayor Mike Duggan celebrated the vote shortly after on social media, thanking the City Council for taking a “strong stance.”

“Designating the Renaissance Center as historic office buildings would have killed any realistic hope of redevelopment and pretty much guaranteed Detroit would have five empty towers sitting on the riverfront for the next 30-40 years,” Duggan said in a statement.

Designating the Renaissance Center as historic office buildings would have killed any realistic hope of redevelopment and pretty much guaranteed Detroit would have five empty towers sitting on the riverfront for the next 30-40 years.

Thanks to Detroit City Council’s strong… pic.twitter.com/2yBIscLObW

— Mayor Mike Duggan (@MayorMikeDuggan) March 4, 2025

Council Member Angela Whitfield-Calloway was the lone voice in support of studying the site’s historic value. She said a historic review would force more public input on what happens to the site.

“I am asking that we allow people to speak,” she said. “I’m asking us to pause and not be so quick to go with new developments without really looking at what we can preserve.”

Whitfield-Calloway argued Detroit too often demolishes its own history. She lamented downtown being filled with “Lego-style buildings that don’t have any kind of architectural flavor.”

Representatives of General Motors and Rock described the Renaissance Center as stale, obsolete, confusing to navigate and exclusionary to residents. But they also say the building is essential to Detroit’s skyline and believe their plan has plenty of flavor.

Jennifer Dewey, general counsel for General Motors, said it’s hard to conceptualize how big and empty the RenCen is. The office towers have twice as much square footage as the Empire State Building while the retail space is the size of Somerset Mall in Oakland County.

“You have this retail space that isn’t accessible from outside foot traffic, so it relies almost entirely on the corporate tenants in the building that more and more we’re just not able to attract,” Dewey said. “These issues compound upon one another.”

Related:

• Renaissance Center looks to future. Should taxpayers help pay the bill?
• 2 Detroit RenCen towers could be torn down as part of new plan
• RenCen seeks rebirth, visitors seek directions: A day inside Detroit landmark

Council Member Fred Durhal III said attaching a historic designation limits the conversation on improving a “big block of concrete” along the riverfront. He said keeping the integrity of Detroit’s skyline is important, but so is having a good use for the buildings that make it up.

“We’ve got to get rid of our emotional attachment to certain things, as long as we keep some of the integrity,” Durhal said.

A committee chaired by Durhal hosted the developers last week. On Tuesday, he said there will be plenty of opportunities for more public engagement. The council’s sign off is needed on a variety of mechanisms to carry out the redevelopment and a community benefits negotiation is expected.

Durhal said he doesn’t think Tuesday’s vote signals that the council will be quick to approve every step of the process.

“Apples are apples and oranges are oranges,” he said. “Those discussions still need to happen.”

Developers said they need public financing to help fund the project, including a transformational brownfield incentive that reimburses costs with future tax revenue. Gilbert used the transformational brownfield program to build the Hudson’s Site, which GM is moving its corporate offices into.

Durhal and Council Member Coleman Young II said approving a historic study would send the wrong message to partners in the state Legislature who also need to sign off on tax breaks.

“It sends a signal to our partners in the state that we’re serious,” Young said. “If we passed that (it would suggest) we’re playing games. (House Speaker) Matt Hall, who has already been opposed to tax incentives, will take that and run with it.”

It would be the first time a tax incentive was issued to build or renovate the Renaissance Center. GM didn’t seek public assistance to fund a $500 million renovation of the complex in 2004.

Council President Pro Tem James Tate said denying this historic review “doesn’t give a green light to total demolition” of the towers, which he’s opposed to. Tate scolded GM and Rock last week for their public rollout, suggesting it presented a threat of losing the whole building.

He’s more open to the presentation heard last week.

“It felt, as it was rolled out initially, almost like if you don’t do this we’re going to demolish the whole thing,” Tate said last week. “This so-called threat or ultimatum, I’m not hearing that from you all at this point.”

How historic is it anyway? 

Some council members questioned the historic value of the building, citing long-running criticism that the Renaissance Center is uninviting and insular, excluding residents in the majority-Black city.

Council Member Gabriela Santiago-Romero said the Renaissance Center lacks cultural significance, arguing its “racist history” makes it unworthy of historic designation. Durhal compared the “racist aspect” of the building to Confederate monuments that have been taken down in some places.

However, HDAB Director Janese Chapman said that context is what gives the building cultural significance.

“History tells a story, and it’s not always peaches and cream,” Chapman said.

The Renaissance Center is located in Santiago-Romero’s district. She’s been in communication with the developers and worried a historic study would “prolong any kind of development conversations.”

Council Member Mary Waters said the complex “hasn’t meant much to Black people” because of its exclusionary design. She’s never felt welcome there and doesn’t want Detroiters to idolize it.

“It is a building, that’s really all it is,” Waters said. “That’s the thing that’s driving me not to feel so sentimental about it. I just don’t see any history in it for Black people.”

Whitfield-Calloway disagreed with the characterization, saying Black visitors and Black-owned businesses have always been allowed inside.

“My memories are different than yours,” Whitfield Calloway says. “There were Black businesses in the Renaissance Center, law firms, there was a lot of shopping, a movie theater. When I was there I saw Black and white kids. It never not allowed Black people in its doors.”

Young’s father, who was both Detroit’s longest-serving and first Black mayor, played a major role in the Renaissance Center’s construction. But Young doesn’t see the complex as sacred and unchangeable.

“I think it did live up to what it was supposed to live up to but times change and people change,” Young said. “Affordable housing on the riverfront, that’s revolutionary.”