Birmingham Developer Wants to Buy Belle Isle For $1 Billion
Birmingham resident Rodney Lockwood suggests turning Detroit's Belle Isle into independent city-state.
One Birmingham developer wants to make one big purchase in Detroit, but it's not a building or vacant land. No, Birmingham resident and developer Rodney Lockwood, Jr. is leading up a group who wants to buy the 982-acre Belle Isle — for $1 billion. "Prominent Republicans in Michigan will gather soon to hear a plan for investors to buy Belle Isle from the city of Detroit for $1 billion and turn the island park into a semi-independent city-state of 35,000 people with its own laws, government and currency," Steve Neavling of MotorCityMuckraker.com writes. Inspired by the philosophies of Ayn Rand, Lockwood is the author of a book on the subject, Belle Aisle. The book looks at the possibility of an independent city state on Belle Isle that would…
