Dorro and Goliath
U-M alum Rachael Merritt and her team hope to offer an alternative to Amazon with Dorro.
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News
Sirens’ Song
As the sky spasmed with lightning in the early hours of April 15, smartphones throughout Washtenaw County shrieked: TORNADO WARNING. Mournful wails could be heard outside, even above the thunder and bullet-hail of rain. Ann Arbor’s twenty-two outdoor warning sirens were sounding an emergency for the first time since the bow echo thunderstorm in July 2023.
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Roundabout Rejuvenation
After over a dozen years of crashes and complaints, the State and Ellsworth roundabout will be revamped in 2027.
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All the Lonely People
People experience loneliness when “perceptions of their social relationships don’t match what they would ideally like them to be. Not everyone who feels lonely is truly alone and not everyone who is socially isolated feels lonely," says University of Michigan social epidemiologist Lindsay Kobayashi. The importance of third places—low-cost or free community spaces like parks, coffee shops, and libraries where people can find connection outside of home (a first place) and work (a second place)—is becoming a more popular topic in public health research.
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Comprehensive Plan: What Happens Now?
In mid-April, Ann Arbor’s planning commission held its first working session aimed at figuring out zoning and other legal language changes based on the city’s new Comprehensive Land Use Plan (CLUP). Planning staff arrived with three proposed outlines of implementation steps the commission could take, including a set of seven priorities the planners recommended.
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Downtown Dead Zone
The west side of the block is a kaleidoscope of historic storefronts housing Vinology restaurant, Crazy Wisdom bookstore, and half a dozen other businesses. Across the street, the vacant stone-and-glass facades of PNC and JP Morgan Chase loom over the sidewalk like silent ghosts.
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The Road Less Travelable
Those tire-swallowing holes are created during the weather’s freeze and thaw cycle where subfreezing temperatures are quickly followed by fifty-degree days. Moisture like snow and ice melt seeps into the pavement, freezes and expands, and then thaws to create gaps.
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Mamady Camara Petitions for Release
On April 1, 2026, Mamady Camara, an asylum seeker from Guinea living in Ypsilanti, “celebrated” his twenty-first birthday in a cell at North Lake Processing Center in Baldwin, Michigan.
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A Cinematic Journey Through Town
Ann Arbor native Trevor Zhou is no stranger to bringing his personal life into his films.
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A2SO Link Up
The local orchestra program broadens young people’s horizons—and has a broader reach than just Ann Arbor.
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Queens of the Monarchs
How two friends, and their families, are doing their part to support pollinators.
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Enter the Arena
Ann Arbor bleeds maize and blue year-round, but when college football goes mum in the spring, the Michigan Raptors hope to fill the void.
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Tax Imbalance
A new U-M study highlights inequity in metropolitan tax bases. How does Ann Arbor stack up?
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Mom Bosses of Ann Arbor
Powered by a collaborative spirit and inspired by their journey as mothers, these moms are reshaping the local business landscape.
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Out of Class
Huron has one of Michigan’s highest chronic absenteeism rates: 68.6 percent of its students in the 2024–25 school year—more than two-thirds—missed at least 10 percent, or eighteen days, of class. Ann Arbor Public Schools’ other two traditional high schools aren’t much better: Pioneer’s rate was 63.7 percent, and Skyline’s was 61.6 percent. (Chronic absenteeism rates include excused and unexcused absences, but neither AAPS nor the state collects data on how many of each are occurring.)
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State Budget Slashes Great Start Collaboratives
Washtenaw County will continue to offer services, but others weren’t so lucky.
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April the Cruelest Month?
Students at U-M Law School’s Civil-Criminal Litigation Clinic are campaigning on behalf of Saline resident Changming Fan, who has been ordered to scale back his community garden.
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Innovation District?
One mysterious February morning, three modern, minimalist signs appeared on Plymouth and Traverwood roads: “ANN ARBOR INNOVATION DISTRICT” in clean white letters against gunmetal gray, along with a sciency, symmetrical symbol in simple blue.
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Data Center Traffic
Opponents of the Oracle data center in Saline Township had a laundry list of objections—electricity rate hikes, water consumption, the spoiling of the landscape. But for the moment, the biggest concern is truck traffic.
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