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Detroit Among Top 10 Global Travel Destinations: New York Times

Detroit was one of nine U.S. destinations highlighted by travel writers in the annual "52 Places to Go in 2017" list.

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DETROIT, MI — The Motor City is one of the world’s top 10 travel destinations, the editors of The New York Times’ travel section have determined. The venerable newspaper included Detroit in its “52 Places to Go in 2017” recommendations released Wednesday.

The top destination is Canada, followed by the Atacama Desert in Chile; Agra, India; Zermatt, Switzerland; Botswana, on the Okavango Delta in Africa; Dubrovnik, Croatia; Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming; Tijuana, Mexico; and then Detroit. No. 10 on the list is Hamburg, Germany.

That’s impressive company for a city many had given up for dead a few years ago.

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“Detroit’s revitalization, after its 2013 bankruptcy filing, has long been building,” Elaine Glusac wrote of Detroit. “In 2015, it was named a Unesco City of Design. But 2017 may be the year promise becomes reality. The new QLine streetcar is expected to open in April, connecting the central Woodward Avenue corridor some 3.3 miles between downtown and the revived New Center area. It passes through Midtown, home to the Detroit Institute of Arts, and the entertainment-focused District Detroit, where a stadium opening this fall will be shared by the Detroit Red Wings and, in a return from the suburbs, the Detroit Pistons.”

The Times also solicited ideas on its Facebook of other things you can do while in Detroit:

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Some suggestions included slipping over the border to the No. 1 destination, Canada, but also taking in some domestic treasures, like Belle Isle, The Henry Ford Museum, the Eastern Market and the Heidelberg Project.

  • What is on your must-see-in-Detroit list? Tell us in the comments.

The other U.S. locations on the list included Greenville, South Carolina (12); Minneapolis, Minnesota (23); Napa Valley, California (31); Sedona, Arizona (33); Ketchum, Idaho (35); Birmingham, Alabama (45); and Portland, Oregon (49).

Photo of the Detroit Institute of the Arts by Onasill ~ Bill Badzo via Flickr Commons

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