Since 1990, Macomb Township's population has grown 122 percent, from 22,714 residents to 50,478 as of 2000. Macomb County as a whole grew by 9.9 percent, or 70,750 residents, for a 2000 Census population of 788,149. Nine Macomb County municipalities lost residents while five grew by more than 30 percent each, all in the northern reaches of the county like Macomb Township. There is the Macomb Township of sport-utility vehicles and minivans that clog roads, bringing the first traffic jams only a few years ago. But in the rush to bring suburbia to a place called the country just 10 years ago, the past still hangs on.
Road signs warn of tractor crossings and horse trailers travel the streets.
While construction dust flies across former cropland, some roads remain gravel-topped. There are 35 subdivisions in Macomb Township, an area of 36 square miles. Detroit is about a 45-minute drive. That road access has brought Detroiters and suburbanites farther north in record numbers. Glusac moved to Macomb Township from Detroit in 1974 with her husband and two sons to a modest home on a half-acre when a dairy farm was across the road and a vegetable farm was nearby.