Michael, this is definitely a great idea. Combining community building with education in a common social hub seems like a great tool towards creating vibrancy in cities and regions facing economic decline. Thumbs up for the drawings!
I am really interested in the idea of community gardens and allotment as a way to reduce poverty and improve food security and living conditions for those in need. Green public garden spaces can not only provide an additional classroom to the community but offer empowerment through knowledge and skills (think about new job skills, work opportunities, individual garden allotments, low cost farmers markets,...). It is a win win situation.
Although the Hayes Valley in San Francisco is VERY different from Detroit, it is a really interesting example of a vibrant community that was slowly built in a very challenging area of the city. Behind graphitti walls, one can find the community garden which is great success. The slow process of bringing vibrancy to this neighborhood makes Hayes Valley now a live and exciting area with shops, markets, pop up cafes, parks, new development and even a biergarten!
Below is the link for the Urban Farm. I hope it can bring us more inspiration.
http://www.hayesvalleyfarm.com/

Michael, love the idea of a neigborhood incubator. To me, labs offer experimentation for success and failure with lots of room for surprises. You may want to check out Peter Block's and John McKnight's Abundant Community concept whereby community members address their own needs from right in the community. Here is a link: http://www.abundantcommunity.com/home/book.html

Does anyone know of an existing directory of Detroit community organizations? Maybe http://wiserearth.org/ is a good place to start. It would be great to gather interest and feedback from many groups even at this stage. Maybe the mapping, tagging, and connecting of existing orgs is a concept in itself?

Hi Michael. It's a nice idea!

When you talk about "mobile tool-lending library", that reminds me the following initiative (may be very common around the world) ,-)

http://www.brazilianideas.com/?p=645
and
http://www.brazilianideas.com/?p=677

Hope you find them useful!

Way to go, Michael! Loving your illustration too. I thought you might be interested to check out whether there is anything worth cross-pollinating or building upon from this slightly related concept from our Local Food Challenge earlier this year: http://www.openideo.com/open/localfood/concepting/regional-food-systemcommercial-kitchenfood-entrepreneur-incubatorcollaborative-community/