the buildings one sees today are the ones that "survived" because they were notable. Older buildings are going to be more interesting as a matter of course because the boring ones were torn down to build other buildings.
I live near Detroit and have seen before/after photos. Good on you for speculating the role of survivorship bias, but evidence that you are just plain wrong exists. One example off the top of my head:
https://www.birminghammichiganbank.com/birmingham-national-b...