"It took 10 years for the ancient Greeks to tear down the walls surrounding Troy. In Detroit, it took 25 years to level the ramparts that separated the Renaissance from the city it was supposed to resuscitate. The structures, called berms, are gone. In their place a new RenCen facade is rising. Perhaps the berms could have been vaporized sooner if the legions of Detroiters who hated the pair of two-story concrete structures along Jefferson Avenue had been organized into an army of Homeric proportions. Instead, it took more than two decades of complaints and a change of ownership at the building for the walls of Castle RenCen to be breached. The two berms housed the complex's heating and cooling equipment. Critics slammed them from the moment they arose for creating a fortress-like feeling at the Renaissance. Attempts to make the walls less imposing by planting vines in them did little to lessen the sense of separation. "It never represented the community," said Gene Hopkins, an architect at Detroit's SmithGro
work_description_source
"It took 10 years for the ancient Greeks to tear down the walls surrounding Troy. In Detroit, it took 25 years to level the ramparts that separated the Renaissance from the city it was supposed to resuscitate. The structures, called berms, are gone. In their place a new RenCen facade is rising. Perhaps the berms could have been vaporized sooner if the legions of Detroiters who hated the pair of two-story concrete structures along Jefferson Avenue had been organized into an army of Homeric proportions. Instead, it took more than two decades of complaints and a change of ownership at the building for the walls of Castle RenCen to be breached. The two berms housed the complex's heating and cooling equipment. Critics slammed them from the moment they arose for creating a fortress-like feeling at the Renaissance. Attempts to make the walls less imposing by planting vines in them did little to lessen the sense of separation. "It never represented the community," said Gene Hopkins, an architect at Detroit's SmithGro
Description
false