DETROIT (WXYZ) — The 2024 NFL draft is closing in fast. We’re about six months away from the biggest event the city of Detroit has seen in years.
Work is happening around Detroit right now to get it ready.
7 Action News anchor Brian Abel sat down with Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan Thursday to see what’s going into the transformation.
Abel asked, “Mayor, we are six months out from a pretty big event: this NFL draft. What are the preparations like right now?
“Well, they're very intense,” Duggan said.
Most details of what Detroit's version of the NFL draft will look like are being kept close to the chest, Duggan pointed to three main priorities:
“One, obviously, is safety, the community and the visitors. Second is the beauty and the third is the fan experience,” Duggan said.
It's an experience that will be far different than what we have seen in previous cities like Las Vegas and Kansas City.
“It was away from the central cities. And the city means that you didn't even know you had the draft there. We're talking about building it right through downtown in the Campus Martius area, which means you're going to have to have more entry and exit points because we want the surrounding businesses to benefit. We want this to be a part of downtown,” Duggan said.
Downtown businesses are looking forward to the boom and impressions to change.
“It's going to be the miniature Olympics in a way for us. You know, cities want their Olympics because they want the world to come to their city and experience how great it is. What we are looking at is a miniature Olympics that many people are going to go back and say, Detroit is not what we read about — Detroit is great,” said Larry Mongo, the owner of Cafe D'Mongo’s.
Mongo has watched as the city grew then shriveled in his 50-plus years downtown.
“To know that downtown, then to see it just die — I mean, to the point that the pigeons left — there was nothing to eat with. It was just bare,” Mongo said.
Now, the city is back and the boulevards around him, like Washington, are currently being transformed.
Some of the changes, like the recent Detroit Riverwalk expansion and murals around the city are not part of draft preparation. Others, like highway cleanup, is priority.
“Because people coming in from out of town who saw the freeways look terrible wouldn't say, Gee isn’t MDOT (Michigan Department of Transportation) terrible. They'd say, ooh, that's what the city of Detroit looks like. We'll give them a lot of thought to those kinds of things," Duggan said.
Duggan says he is hoping to replicate one thing from last year’s draft.
“You know, it was a great experience to go to the draft in Kansas City last year, where they were celebrating the Super Bowl championship. So, I just hope we get that chance to do that in Detroit next April,” Duggan said.
