( CNN ) -- The Detroit Free Press and Detroit News will become the first major metropolitan newspapers in the U.S. to end daily home delivery , the papers announced Tuesday . The Detroit News will still be available on newsstands daily , newspaper officials said Tuesday . `` We 're fighting for our survival , '' said David Hunke , publisher of the Free Press and CEO of the Detroit Media Partnership , a joint operating agreement between the two papers . `` We think its time to take a geometric leap forward in what we 've known as newspapers . '' Beginning sometime in the first three months of 2009 , the two newspapers will provide home delivery on Thursdays , Fridays and Sundays only , Hunke said during a news conference in Detroit , Michigan . Papers will be on newsstands every day , and the papers ' online offerings will be expanded , he said . `` The dynamics of delivering information to audiences has changed forever due to technology , '' Hunke said in a statement on the plan . Costs for paper , ink and fuel to deliver papers were forcing the papers into cuts in newsroom talent that would damage their abilities to report the news , Hunke said . Paying for delivery vehicles to cover 300,000 miles nightly , he said , did not make economic sense at a time when 63 percent of readers have broadband Internet access . As for those without computers and broadband access at home , `` this is n't necessarily gon na be the best news for them , '' Hunke said . `` Our economics have become unsustainable , '' said Jonathan Wolman , publisher and editor of the Detroit News . `` We 've got to embrace reality , and we 've got to embrace innovation , '' said Paul Anger , executive editor of the Free Press , owned by Gannett Corp. , the country 's largest newspaper publisher . The Free Press , the nation 's 20th-largest daily paper , had a daily circulation of 298,243 and 605,000 on Sunday as of the end of September . Those numbers were down almost 7 percent and 4 percent , respectively , from the previous six months , according to the Audit Bureau of Circulations . The Detroit News , the country 's 49th largest newspaper , is owned by MediaNews Group and had a daily circulation of 178,280 in September . It does not publish a Sunday edition . The Free Press ' circulation is down 19 percent and the News is down 22 percent since 2002 , the Free Press reported Tuesday . Hunke said the newspapers would face about a 9 percent reduction in their workforces under the plan . However no layoffs in their newsrooms , which he described as `` fiercely competitive , '' were planned . The Detroit Media Partnership employs more than 2,100 people , CNN affiliate WDIV-TV reported . Personnel cuts would be negotiated with the papers ' unions , Hunke said . `` We believe it will break the cycle of buyouts and downsizing '' that has become common in the newspaper industry , Wolman said . Newspaper publishers have had a rough year . Across the industry , daily circulation dropped 4.6 percent in the six months ending in September . Gannett has been in the process of cutting 10 percent of its workforce across its 85 newspapers nationwide . McClatchy Co. , the nation 's second-largest newspaper company , has been pursuing cuts at its papers , including the Miami Herald . Tribune Co. , which owns the Chicago Tribune and Los Angeles Times , among others , announced earlier this month it was filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection . The East Valley Tribune in Mesa , Arizona , a 100,000-circulation newspaper owned by Freedom Newspapers , announced in October it would move from a daily to a four-day publication beginning in January . The national Christian Science Monitor is moving its daily content online and dropping its daily print edition next year . Anger said Tuesday that Detroit readers have been seeking those kinds of changes in how they get their news . `` Generations of readers are telling us they 'd like information delivered in a different way , '' he said , promising `` a fast reading , provocative news report in print as well as online . '' The Detroit papers will price their three-day home delivery subscriptions at $ 12 a month , including a daily edition delivered by e-mail , Hunke said . Wolman said mail subscriptions would be available to home-bound readers .
Detroit News , Detroit Free Press will deliver to homes this year a week . Papers will still be available on newsstands ; online offerings expanded . Free Press ' this year circulation dipped almost 7 percent only three days . Ink , paper , fuel costs mean cuts in reporting under current model , publisher says .