Re: One Story Assembly Plant What If?
Posted by Leeedy On 2014/5/16 15:04:48
Quote:
The photo displayed in this posting is looking southward, but there is no "freeway" shown (we called them "expressways" back then in Detroit) because this photo was taken long prior to the building of the expressway (freeway). The term, "freeway" by the way was borrowed and adopted later from Los Angeles. Detroit actually changed all of the names from "Expressway" to "Freeway"...heaven knows why. But they were originally called expressways. There is a famous photo of a late 1940s all over the internet with a Packard next to a sign that says "To Detroit via Expressway"...
Anyway, when the Edsel Ford Expressway was built it went right down Harper Avenue at this point, this Harper ceased to exist here. When the expressway was built, a concrete retaining wall was poured in at the very edge of Harper and all that was left of the long rectangular parking lot where you see cars sitting (blacktop lower center of the photo along the building) was a narrow access road. The expressway took every inch of land it could get.
At one time prior to this, the Packard Plant property (and a small test track) extended north (lower right) of where Harper Avenue is in this photo.
New car storage/shipping was off in the huge lot on the upper right of this photo-even after the Conner plant was put in operation.
I am attaching two photos I took in 1973. One shows a view looking northward toward the Ford Expressway and what was left of Harper Avenue. I took this from the rooftop of the Packard Plant where I had access to go at the time. You can see two tracks were left at this time and you can see the bed where another was removed.
If you look past the concrete ditch of a freeway (cars are down below) you can see Chrysler's Oilite Bearing facility, Good Year Tire & Rubber, and Mt. Elliot heading north toward Rinshed-Mason. Most of this stuff is gone now. At the time of this photo the north end of Packard along the expressway was occupied by Stone Container Corporation and Essex Wire Corporation.
The other shot I took was while down below on the Edself Ford Expressway looking up at the concrete retaining wall and north end of the Packard plant as seen from the freeway. This is all you could see from the expressway because is is down in a narrow concrete ditch. In the B&W photo shown earlier in the post, I would be driving 30 feet below the surface of what was then Harper Avenue. Today this building is at Concord Avenue and the Edsel Ford Freeway. It is the end of same building you see in the lower end of the B&W photo in this posting. Also, today, all of the windows have sadly been bricked in. Probably why it has not been vandalized any worse than it has...
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Steve203 wrote:
I don't see any inherent defect in a multi-story manufacturing plant.
The multistory plants were favored when gravity feed was used to move parts downward toward the assembly line. When electric conveyors became common, gravity feed was no longer needed. And, of course, a multistory plant presents the problem of getting the parts to the upper floors in the first place. I have seen photos of the inside of Ford Highland Park and Studebaker in South Bend, where rail cars of material were brought into the center of the building and an overhead crane was used to lift the material to a number of balconies on the upper floors. A material handling nightmare compared to plants today.
The Packard plant had no rail access
There is a spur from the mainline running south, past the west side of the Packard foundry, across Harper and the freeway, between the Merlin buildings, across East Grand and on south a couple blocks beyond the south end of the Packard complex. That track is still there today. In the photo, you can see a boxcar crossing Harper.
Conner was a terrible compromise
Yes, but it was the only thing available on short notice, which made missing the opportunity on Willow Run such a costly mistake.
The photo displayed in this posting is looking southward, but there is no "freeway" shown (we called them "expressways" back then in Detroit) because this photo was taken long prior to the building of the expressway (freeway). The term, "freeway" by the way was borrowed and adopted later from Los Angeles. Detroit actually changed all of the names from "Expressway" to "Freeway"...heaven knows why. But they were originally called expressways. There is a famous photo of a late 1940s all over the internet with a Packard next to a sign that says "To Detroit via Expressway"...
Anyway, when the Edsel Ford Expressway was built it went right down Harper Avenue at this point, this Harper ceased to exist here. When the expressway was built, a concrete retaining wall was poured in at the very edge of Harper and all that was left of the long rectangular parking lot where you see cars sitting (blacktop lower center of the photo along the building) was a narrow access road. The expressway took every inch of land it could get.
At one time prior to this, the Packard Plant property (and a small test track) extended north (lower right) of where Harper Avenue is in this photo.
New car storage/shipping was off in the huge lot on the upper right of this photo-even after the Conner plant was put in operation.
I am attaching two photos I took in 1973. One shows a view looking northward toward the Ford Expressway and what was left of Harper Avenue. I took this from the rooftop of the Packard Plant where I had access to go at the time. You can see two tracks were left at this time and you can see the bed where another was removed.
If you look past the concrete ditch of a freeway (cars are down below) you can see Chrysler's Oilite Bearing facility, Good Year Tire & Rubber, and Mt. Elliot heading north toward Rinshed-Mason. Most of this stuff is gone now. At the time of this photo the north end of Packard along the expressway was occupied by Stone Container Corporation and Essex Wire Corporation.
The other shot I took was while down below on the Edself Ford Expressway looking up at the concrete retaining wall and north end of the Packard plant as seen from the freeway. This is all you could see from the expressway because is is down in a narrow concrete ditch. In the B&W photo shown earlier in the post, I would be driving 30 feet below the surface of what was then Harper Avenue. Today this building is at Concord Avenue and the Edsel Ford Freeway. It is the end of same building you see in the lower end of the B&W photo in this posting. Also, today, all of the windows have sadly been bricked in. Probably why it has not been vandalized any worse than it has...
Attach file:
(111.35 KB)
(117.43 KB)
(75.35 KB)
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