The only time I ever go downtown is for events at the Renaissance Center and Cobo Hall. There's really no reason to otherwise, unless you like to gamble. Pretty much everywhere outside of the immediate area around Cobo is really bad anyway.
> There's really no reason to otherwise, unless you like to gamble.
That's really not true. There's a ton of fantastic restaurants/coffee places that don't exist in the suburbs (Mudgie's, Slowe's, Great Lakes Coffee, etc), the Detroit Art Institute in Midtown (including famous works like Van Gogh's self portrait), a music scene ranging from the big pop stars at Fox Theater to the up and coming indie bands at the Magic Stick, there's all the sporting events, there's ice skating at Campus Martius during the winter and free music at Grand Circus during the summer, there's the Opera House, there's touring Broadway shows at the Fox, there's smaller but still professional theater at the Hillberry, and there's a few regular tech meetups that take place downtown (Detroit Google Developer's Group, Lambda Lounge, Detroit Craftsman's Guild). There's almost always something going on in the Downtown/Midtown area.
The other problem Detroit has is the freeways. I fail to understand why I-75 in the middle of the downtown area goes down from 4 lanes to 2 lanes of traffic. Boggles the mind. I've learned to avoid the area during major events because the freeway turns into a parking lot down there.
The Greektown area is nicer. Fairly good restaurants aimed at younger people, I've frequented that area often without a problem.
The "Down Town" area is perfectly fine. I have friends who live down town. Just when you leave that bubble protected by freeways it gets very bad very fast.
Sorry, I was kind of including the Greektown area in that general area. I don't really gamble so I usually don't go their but the food is pretty good. Most of the stops on the people mover seem to be decent neighborhoods as well.
