Detroit Free Press from Detroit, Michigan • 7

FRIDAY, AUG. 17, 2007 7 Evergreen Cemetery: A man visits his brother, buried in 1989 in the closest grave to Woodward. New business called Regeneration. Store owners are optimistic, despite bad news about prior tenants. Nusach H'ari cemetery, 21905 Woodward, Ferndale.

Cantankerous gravedigger endorses bikes and carriages, New Woodward bridge over 8 Mile. The transformation is stunning. not dream cars. TardinAl fnnr Anartmontc FIHorlw laHu turnc JL on her bedroom AC to drown out Woodward Intersection of Woodward and Old Woodward: Sidewalks end! The walk turns into a hike. 11 Royal Oak Ford: Picketer and used-car salesman exchange insults.

1 Umi rfr'lmT j-m i 'nl(iSi in iini ''j ROMAIN BLANQUARTDetroit Free Press Stanley Kokuba, 83, reads a plaque in front of The Whitney restaurant Monday. ROMAIN BLANQUARTDetroit Free Press Car salesman Michael Sera, 44, of Clarkston. Gravedigger Paul Robinson drives a tractor while helper Darrell Osborne rides. streetwalkers. But a construction project has transformed the area.

Crosswalks are made of brick and the bridges are festooned with auto-centric artwork. We saw no hookers. Woodward in Ferndale is lined with Jewish cemeteries on the west, and one is home to gravedigger Paul Robison, 57, a cantankerous fellow who runs off trespassers at Nusach H'ari. "I think it's a lovely avenue," said the man, who has a long yellowish beard and tends to shout. "I wish they would close it down and make everybody have bicycles and carriages." As night fell, we walked further into Pleasant Ridge and found some women in an empty store, painting window frames, drinking champagne and trying to stay positive.

Nicole Freund's dream with her friend Melanie Williams is to open a vintage clothing store next month. The former home of Mattress King has big windows and the perfect space. But as they learned only recently, it also had a robbery and shooting last New Year's Eve, spurring Mattress King to vacate. Freund, 27, and Williams, 32, said they learned this after committing to the space, and after Williams moved here from Boulder, Colo. But, "we kind of think it's karmic," Williams said.

And after that, 14 12 hours and 12 miles after we started our trek, with the moon rising, we called it a night. TUESDAY, AUG. 14: Dear Journal: Our day started near 1-696 under pleasant skies and a gentle breeze. Within minutes, our serenity was a memory. Gordon Bibby, 80, was sweeping a parking lot on the east side of the road at 7:30 a.m.

"People that are going to stand and watch the cars go by are going to try to park in this parking lot," he said of the Dream Cruise. "People are Hooray for me, the hell with That's the problem." We walked on, and Romain, the photographer, nearly impaled his eyeball on a tree branch. Next, we ran across a used car salesman tying balloons to vehicles at Royal Oak Ford. Everything was peachy as Michael Sera, 44, of Clarkston reminisced about cruising in the 1970s. "Woodward is still very active," Sera said.

As if to prove that point, a woman ran up with a flier, and regaled us with rapid-fire allegations about a union dispute involving the dealership. As she spoke, Sera chimed in, and their voices grew louder: "She's paid to picket! She crazy!" Sera said. ROMAIN BLANQUARTDetroit Free Press Nicole Freund opens a bottle of champagne while painting her store in Pleasant Ridge with co-owner Melanie Williams, not pictured, and her mother. From previous page The fairly new Model Plaza shopping center anchors the north end of town, but adjacent to it is another grim reminder of the automobile glory days. The shuttered Model factory sits forlornly next door.

At this place where Henry Ford perfected the assembly line, a vacationing architecture student from Vienna, Austria, was snapping photos. "I think it's sad," Mariela Dittrich, 38, said of the building, which has shattered windows and overgrown trees out front. The first real road More blocks up, a sign declared the nation's first concrete road had been poured on Woodward between McNichols and 7 Mile. In 1909, the planks and bricks gave way to new technology, and America's roads were forever changed. Today that narrow strip is 10 lanes wide.

And McNichols marks the beginning of the end of Woodward's blight. We strolled past leafy Palmer Park, where the people who were out were clumped together under shade trees to avoid the increas ingly warm sun. At Grixdale, on our left, the golf course ran along the road, and we watched Harry Vance, 69, hole a 40-foot putt and win $20 off his playing partners. "Woodward is such a beautiful street," he said, then headed off to brag. Near the state fairgrounds, we finally saw our first hot rod, which ventured down from the northern epicenter of the upcoming Woodward Dream Cruise.

The car was black with flames on the side as it blazed past. A pedometer on my belt showed we'd taken nearly 25,000 steps to get here. Why don't more cruisers come down into the city? At Evergreen Cemetery, graves extend right up to the sidewalk. We found John Con-ley, 64, peering down at one: His brother died from diabetes at 44 in 1989. "You have to come and say a few words, you know? Tell him his older brother is doing all right," Conley said, a tall can of Arizona ice tea in his handWe walked on, toward the city's edge, to the newly redone 8 Mile overpass.

Eight Mile and Woodward is familiar, not only for the confluence of streets, but also for money and effort with so much decay nearby? Just two blocks up, at Trowbridge, the former site of Aknartoon's restaurant looked bombed out. Two boys stood in front, waiting on the bus. "Woodward's one of the best streets out here. It's my street," said a 15-year-old as he rolled a blunt that's marijuana in a cigar wrapper. But "Woodward do got some downfalls prostitutes, bums out here." It was lunchtime and we were hungry.

Keep walking? Settle for a coney island? But then we noticed Nandi's Knowledge Cafe Ray's Grill, one place with two names just north of Highland Street, and two tables out front. A sidewalk cafe. In Highland Park. With wireless Internet access. This is the Highland Park we know from the this town looks better than I remember.

Several plazas have popped up, filling vacant fields or replacing decay. See next page HEARD ON THE AVENUE FRED HILL, 57, LATANYA JOHNSON, 46, 1 -a T-- I 1 of Woodhaven of Detroit GARY MILLER, 61, of Romeo sits in his friend's cream-colored 1961 Thunder- JOHNNY GREEN, 56, a City of Detroit bus driver, as he took a break and FELICIA ELAM, 25, of Detroit pushes her 2-year-old son, Harry Lipscomb, down PAUL KUTSCHMAN, 47, of Sterling Heights is the used-car manager at the Garden Rnwl on drives a city street sweeper on Wood i nf iT J.T. JOHNSON, 79, of Detroit, after playing a round of golf at Palmer Park: "Woodward has always been a dividing area. If you could find Woodward, you could find anywhere you wanted to go." James Martin Chevrolet-Buick a few blocks south of Grand Boulevard: "I'm hoping they bring the cruise down into the city." ward near Grand Boulevard: "I love Woodward. I always came down here for the Thanksgiving Day parade movies down at the Grand Circus." bird in a Wendy's parking lot in Ferndale: "I grew up in the country, but Woodward was what you heard about when people talked about Detroit." parked his bus on Woodward near State Fair, called Woodward: "A lifeline to the metro area.

Traffic, shopping, restaurants. What would I change? The price of gas." Woodward south of Highland Park: "We love Detroit. Everybody else wants to move, but I'm staying. I love Woodward. I want to be here until I'm old and gray." "This is a very famous street.

It's really starting to happen in Midtown now. We love it downtown. Theater, arts, Tigers. I'm not going to say the Lions, but they're here, too. I got my first haircut at J.L.

Hudson when it was here.".