Bridge construction has this Detroit resident wearing a mask outside

The delay in the Gordie Howe International Bridge has caused an impact for years on the Michigan community of Delray. CTV Windsor’s Sanjay Maru reports.

In Detroit’s Delray neighbourhood, some streets that were once quiet are now lined with truck traffic, kicking up dust that settles on homes, porches, and cars.

A few blocks over, empty lots and boarded-up houses mark where families once lived for generations, cleared to make way for the Gordie Howe International Bridge.

For those who remain, the changes are constant — and deeply felt.

“We’ve been the ones that sacrificed the most,” said Scott Brines.

Just across the Detroit River from Windsor’s Sandwich neighbourhood, Delray is the American-side community directly connected to the new bridge — and like Sandwich, one of the oldest neighbourhoods in the region.

The project is expected to transform cross-border trade, but residents here say the cost has fallen heavily on their community.

“It was a small village,” Brines said.

“That was a hard thing to watch get dismantled.”

A neighbourhood reshaped

Delray has long been defined by the people who stayed — often for decades, sometimes for generations.

Even before the bridge, it had been changing. Factories closed. Businesses disappeared. Homes fell into disrepair.

Marion Carter, who moved to Delray at 10 years old and is now 72, said those changes started long before the bridge arrived — pointing to the loss of industry and the impact of drugs in the area.

“I used to ride my bike around here,” he said.

“But things started getting run down around the 70s.”

Delray was once a thriving, working-class neighbourhood along the Detroit River, built around industry and home to thousands of families, many of them immigrants.

By the early 20th century, it was a busy, tight-knit community with a strong local economy.

But decades of industrial expansion, pollution and demolition led to population loss and decline long before the bridge project arrived.

To build the new U.S. port of entry, large sections of the neighbourhood were acquired and cleared — breaking up blocks where multiple generations of families had lived side by side.

“There used to be houses everywhere,” said longtime resident Danny Heggie.

“Now, there’s just a few left.”

For some, the change brought opportunity.

Construction on the Gordie Howe International Bridge began in 2018, but activity ramped up significantly in 2020 — when demolition, heavy truck traffic, and large-scale work in Delray began to reshape the neighbourhood.

Gary Williams, who spent most of his life in Delray, said he took part in the City of Detroit’s home swap program — trading his aging house for a fully renovated one elsewhere in the city in 2021.

“They tore mine down,” the 74-year-old said.

“But they gave me a beautiful house. New roof, everything.”

Others point to upgrades made through the bridge project’s Community Benefits Plan, including repairs to homes and support for local programs. More than 100 houses received improvements like new roofs, windows or HVAC systems.

“They helped people get their roof and windows fixed for free. That’s good,” said Carter, adding conditions in the neighbourhood are “so much better now.”

But for those who remain, the benefits don’t always outweigh what’s been lost.

Living with the impact

Residents describe a neighbourhood that feels fundamentally altered — not just in how it looks, but in how it functions day to day.

“There’s a lot more traffic now,” Heggie said.

“A lot of dirt, dust blowing constantly.”

For Brines, that impact is personal.

“I have to spray down my porch every day. It gets into everything — inside the house, on the street. It’s everywhere.”

Residents say pollution in Delray has long come from multiple sources, including nearby Zug Island, and the Gordie Howe bridge construction has only added to those conditions.

Scott Brines is a 20-year resident of the Delray neighbourhood and director of the Southwest Detroit Community Benefits Coalition — a group formed in 2008 as plans for a second bridge crossing advanced and attention turned to Delray.

Speaking to CTV News while wearing a mask outside his home, he said the environmental strain has become a health concern.

“I can’t breathe in my own home,” said Brines.

It’s one of several issues residents say have intensified as bridge construction continues and one reason delays tied to the project have hit particularly hard in Delray.

When politics reaches the neighbourhood

The bridge has also become a political flashpoint — including a threat from U.S. President Donald Trump earlier this year to block its opening, accusing Canada of treating the U.S. unfairly.

While much of that rhetoric has been framed as a cross-border dispute, Brines says the consequences don’t stop at one country.

“It’s not just Canadians,” he said.

“It hurts us too.”

For residents in Delray, he says, any effort to delay or block the bridge means prolonging the disruption — extending construction, traffic, and environmental impacts that have already reshaped the neighbourhood.

“We’ve already been through so much,” he said.

“And then it feels like it’s getting dragged out again.”

A community in between

Today, Delray is caught in a difficult position.

Some residents are determined to stay, holding onto homes and a sense of place that still matters to them.

“A lot of people who live here have lived here for a long time. A lot of them died here,” said Carter.

But others are ready to leave, worn down by years of change and uncertainty.

“There’s people who just want out, but there’s people who love it here,” said Brines, adding he sees himself “somewhere in the middle.”

He still believes in what the neighbourhood could be, pointing to its riverfront, its history, and its proximity to a major international crossing.

What comes next

Despite everything, there is still cautious hope tied to the bridge’s eventual opening.

Residents say they want to see the kind of investment and attention that was promised — not just for trade, but for the community that made way for it.

Brines says the goal was never just to see a bridge built.

It was to see the creation of something that benefits both sides of the border — including the neighbourhoods closest to it.

“We just want to be treated like a community,” he said.