Quote:
Steve203 wrote:
any kid from the east side saw never-ending series of trucks hauling bodies
The size of the effort becomes apparent when you start running some numbers. An auto plant can turn out 500 cars in a 8 hr shift. That double decker load of Hudsons kept the plant busy for about 10 minutes. So you're looking at 6 truckloads going to Hudson, another 6 truckloads going to Chrysler, and another 6 loads going to Packard, per hour, in that thee block area bounded by St Jean, Conner, Warren and Jefferson.
Last company I know of that was moving semi-finished car bodies around was AMC. I took the tour of Kenosha assembly in 75, and I remember I was surprised when the guide said many of the bodies were shipped from their plant in Milwaukee. I don't remember how he said they were shipped, though I figure, with the distance involved, it was probably by rail.
I do however still see truck cabs being shipped around once in a while.
People made things in Detroit back in those days and everybody was working,
The last few times I have gone to the auto show at Cobo, I have come back via Michigan, rather than getting back on the freeway. Driving Michigan at 4pm on a weekday is a snap these days. Little traffic. I fly past Clark St, which would have been jammed with Cadillac workers 50 years ago. Now I don't hit any traffic until I'm in Dearborn.
Yes... a good average, but even this number is tiny compared to what the Ford Rouge plant was gushing out in Mustangs, Falcons and Rancheros during the mid-1960s! They were cookin' it!
RE: AMC being last to ship semi-finished bodies around... The practice has continued in much more recent years. Toyota was doing it for years with their Celica convertibles (tops were whacked off and converted into folding tops at ASC's remote facilities). Also the things I see most in California being carted around unfinished are trucks... especially imported pickups. Usually the cab and chassis are on one truck... the beds on another! Of course there are many reasons why. I suspect there are still offline assemblies of specialty vehicles going on somewhere in the country still today.
Perhaps the most amazing of these kinds of arrangements was with Cadillac Allante of late 1980s-early 1990s years. My Allante was mostly built in Italy and then the semi-finished car body was flown over via Alitalia (and some Lufthansa) 747s to Detroit to be finished off with engines and running gear. Cadillac called it their "Air Bridge" assembly.
RE: driving around in Detroit and today's lack of traffic... Yes, while I don't have many occasions to drive around in Detroit anymore, when I gave a bus tour for the Packard Club 2013 National Meet I was shocked to see how once car-choked streets didn't even have traffic lights anymore! SOME did not even have STOP signs!!!!! When we made a lengthy stop at the Packard Plant, I believe 2 whole cars trickled by for that entire time! I can remember when there were multiple traffic lights and the intersection of Concord and EGB was bustling-7 days a week! Looking at it now is like a bad science fiction movie. I still have not gotten over it.
And Michigan avenue? OMG! Between Clark Avenue Cadillac plant and Briggs Stadium letting out after a game... there would be bumper-to-bumper traffic. This, even with police there directing traffic flow! And Jefferson over near EGB near the Belle Isle bridge when a shift changed at U.S. Rubber??? Pandemonium. All of which is why EGB used to have a tunnel (now as I discovered filled in) to bypass the intersection of East Jefferson.
But that's all gone now. I sure miss it.
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