Ford announced there is not enough profit in making cars so they are getting out of that business. They are buying old railroad depots instead.
Not even close, Farmer Bill. The company is concentrating on vehicles it can make money on...trucks, SUV’s, crossovers, and Mustangs.
Jeff C
How does One get those red arrows in the posting?
Report: Ford directors briefed on Detroit train station plan
Estate acquisition proposal at the May 10th., 2018 meeting.
"It doesn't need a vote, but it requires buy-in," Ford said.
Ford Motor Co. spokesman Said Deep declined to confirm Edsel Ford's comments.
"We do not discuss details of board of directors meetings," he said in an email.
"I can tell you that we are very excited about our return to Detroit this year beginning with our electric vehicle and autonomous vehicle teams relocating to the Factory in Corktown. We expect to grow our presence in Detroit and will share more details in the future."
Purchasing the station would greatly bolster Ford's recent move to buy and fix up the Factory, an old factory in the area, for 220 members of its self-driving and electric vehicle team, known as Team Edison. Company Chairman Bill Ford has said the company is eager to re-establish a presence in Detroit, where his great-grandfather established the company. Edsel Ford II also is a great-grandson of Henry Ford.
Locating in Corktown, 7 miles down Michigan Avenue from the company's Dearborn headquarters, also is seen as helping the company recruit young talent interested in an urban environment. While the company told the Free Press in March it remains committed to Dearborn and updating its extensive facilities there, it has workers housed in the Fairlane Center shopping mall and dated offices.
Proposals to redevelop the train station, which has become symbolic of Detroit's ruins, have come and gone over the years. Negotiations with the depot owner, Manuel (Matty) Maroun, have been described by those familiar with recent discussions as complex and difficult.
The mayor's office and his redevelopment team are working to make a deal a reality,
Even given Detroit's downtown resurgence in the past six years, this would be one of the most significant redevelopment projects in the city so far.
Source: Detroit Free Press & WWJ News Radio, Detroit - May 1, 2018 • Over Night, Talk Radio, (The RedEye), there seems to be a lot of interest from the listeners calling in, to talk about this news story.
Gary
Attachments
How does One get those red arrows in the posting?
with photo editing software, such as Photoshop... or others.
My son works for ford Michigan central not only in play but a dozen surrounding buildings Mark fields vision for Dearborn campus seemato be scaled back have been going to area off and on for years change is unbelievable in area by the way SLO’s is a great restaurant one block away
I was only in Detroit only 2 times in my life, but I'll always remember how the neighborhoods looked, and how badly rundown they were. It's great to hear they are getting a shot in the arm again. + Jobs moving back into the areas....Seems like the #1/#2 qualifications to get a job is not doing drugs, and a prior police record. It really hard to believe how America has fallen !
The continuing saga about The Michigan Central Station. Could be great news for Metro Detroit.
Let’s take a look at a Google Map.
The Michigan Central Station is only nine miles from, Ford Motor Company Headquarters. The Ford Glass House is the nick name. Today I spend several hours in my vehicle and had a chance to listen to a lot of talk radio. WWJ & WJR, news talk radio.
The listeners called in with a variety of view points and what they saw going on at Detroit Central Station. Several callers have noticed over twenty work trucks on the property and they were speculating that these workmen were doing a structural analysis on the building.
Another caller talked about the price to rent a house went up from $600 to $1800 a month for a two bedroom bungalow. A guy who owns a small auto shop was offered 1.3 million dollars and turned it down,
Hope this helps: Gary
Attachments
Very interesting, hopefully the structural analysis of the building is such that it is sound enough to renovate it. Lets keep our fingers crossed!
The continuing saga about The Michigan Central Station. Could be great news for Metro Detroit.
Rumors that Ford Motor Company might buy and renovate the famous Michigan Central Station have run rampant since early March, and now it seems that the automaker's board of directors might vote on the project as early as next week.
The automaker's upcoming annual shareholder's meeting will take place on May 10, but it's unclear if this project will be brought up then. What is certain is that Edsel B. Ford II, the great-grandson of Henry Ford, has confirmed to Crain's, a Detroit-based business publication, that the Blue Oval's board has been "briefed" on the possible acquisition, and that it would be further discussed at the upcoming meeting.
“It doesn’t need a vote, but it requires buy-in,” Ford told Crain's.
The massive multi-story building closed down in 1988 and has remained empty since. Over the years, it has become a staple of Detroit's grandiose and tough past, as well as an icon of something called "ruin porn," which appeals to photographers and thrill-seekers looking to explore dilapidated structures around the world. When the story first emerged, The Drive caught up with a Detroit native who grew up across the street from the station and is very much so pro-Ford takeover.
Ford has expanded its presence in Detroit little by little, especially when it comes to housing its new propulsion systems development teams such as hybrid and fully electric powerplants. The rumors claim that if Ford were to buy the old station, it would feature office space for its electric and autonomous vehicle teams, as well as commercial real estate on the bottom
Source: The Drive Magazine, May 5, 2018
Gary
Attachments
Images (2)
The continuing saga about The Michigan Central Station.
Detroit train depot lit up, but no Ford purchase news.
To learn more: Click here
Source: Detroit Free Press & AP Detroit
WWJ - News Radio, Detroit is reporting a decision might come today.
Gary
Attachments
Sent from my iPhone
Blue Oval will purchase the long-vacant Michigan Central Depot.
Ford Motor Co. is quietly moving one of its teams into new Corktown digs Thursday, a prelude to an expected mid-June announcement that the Blue Oval will purchase the long-vacant Michigan Central Depot.
Negotiations between Ford and the depot's owner, the real estate arm of the Moroun family's Central Transport International Inc., have accelerated in recent weeks as the landmark deal to buy the historic train station and assemble land for a surrounding urban campus take shape and move toward a deal, according to three sources familiar with the situation.
No deal is done, cautioned a source close to the discussions.
The business teams for autonomous technology and electrification are moving into the Corktown facility known as The Factory at Michigan Avenue and Rosa Parks Boulevard. Ford is also said to be interested in a block-long facility known as The Alchemy behind The Factory, as well as an abandoned book depository near the train station. The train station and surrounding campus would act as Ford's home base for next-generation mobility, electrification and autonomous vehicle development.
Link to Today’s Article: Detroit News
Gary
Attachments
The long-empty Michigan Central Depot in Detroit's Corktown has changed ownership from the billionaire Moroun family to an entity registered to a New York law firm, ahead of an expected mid-June announcement that Ford Motor Co. will redevelop the building.
The warrant deed was transferred earlier this month by the Moroun-owned MCS Crown Land Development Co. LLC to New Investment Properties I LLC, linked to the law firm Phillips Lytle LLP. No price was given.
On the same day, the Moroun company also transferred ownership of the former Detroit Public Schools book depository building next to the depot to a separate entity called New Investment Properties II LLC. That has a contract price for $8 million.
Ford is expected to make a mid-June announcement that it is purchasing the long-vacant train station. The company in late May began moving its electric and autonomous vehicle teams into a recently renovated building a few blocks east of the train station.
More details to come.• • • • Click here for today’s news
Gary
Attachments
This is getting very interesting! Thanks for keeping us posted Gary.
Nice to see, Detroit deserved a lot better than it has seen over the past decades. It was the tell tale for a lot of the industrial decline we have seen in the US that has hit so many areas/towns, can only hope that Detroit coming back to life is a tell tale for the future of other places. I have heard through the grapevine that it is attracting tech startups, it is starting to attract the arts communities, and that is always a good sign for a town. Not long ago houses in Detroit were for sale for 9 or 10k, this tells a lot.
I just saw on Google an announcement about the station. One car company is going to have to fix or repair daily the station for some time!
J Daddy posted this thread
Looks Like its Official - Ford purchases the Central Michigan Depot Train Station!
Certainly an exciting development for Detroit and the entire SE Michigan region.
Question, where is it stated anywhere Ford wants the building? Maybe they just want the land?
Dominic Mazoch posted:I just saw on Google an announcement about the station. One car company is going to have to fix or repair daily the station for some time!
Very tricky …….. hopefully, there won't be anyone near the station found on road dead.
superwarp1 posted:Question, where is it stated anywhere Ford wants the building? Maybe they just want the land?
Hi superwarp1
Ford Motor is going to refurbish the station, I would send you more information, but I am on my iPhone. There is a large power outage on my side of town.
Richie C. posted:Dominic Mazoch posted:I just saw on Google an announcement about the station. One car company is going to have to fix or repair daily the station for some time!
Very tricky …….. hopefully, there won't be anyone near the station found on road dead.
Kid what you may, I am a GM man myself, but it marks a new dawn to era of the a new vehicle with zero emissions, zero incidents, and zero congestion.
What will stem of this new technology will create a hub of activity and I am happy to see the station will be the center of this new investment and that it was saved from the Counsels decision to raise it in 2010.
J Daddy posted:What will stem of this new technology will create a hub of activity and I am happy to see the station will be the center of this new investment and that it was saved from the Counsels decision to raise it in 2010.
You mean they were trying to make it taller, i.e. "raise", back in 2010?
Hot Water posted:J Daddy posted:What will stem of this new technology will create a hub of activity and I am happy to see the station will be the center of this new investment and that it was saved from the Counsels decision to raise it in 2010.
You mean they were trying to make it taller, i.e. "raise", back in 2010?
LOL … darned spell check... raze...
Richie C. posted:Dominic Mazoch posted:I just saw on Google an announcement about the station. One car company is going to have to fix or repair daily the station for some time!
Very tricky …….. hopefully, there won't be anyone near the station found on road dead.
....from ex 70's exploding gas tanks!
BTW, to me, electric cars are at this time not the green concept people think they are. Batteries are haz-mats. Our grid system in this country is not the best. High power lines, when energized, can produce OZONE plus radio and other electromagnetic polution. Electrical power lines, like the wiring on our layouts, have voltage drops. Windmills have there own issues.....
I remember that to save trees and forests people need to use plastic bags.....
I am not saying no to electric cars. Just do not make this the plastic bag on 'droids!
Attachments
Dominic Mazoch posted:Richie C. posted:Dominic Mazoch posted:I just saw on Google an announcement about the station. One car company is going to have to fix or repair daily the station for some time!
Very tricky …….. hopefully, there won't be anyone near the station found on road dead.
....from ex 70's exploding gas tanks!
BTW, to me, electric cars are at this time not the green concept people think they are. Batteries are haz-mats. Our grid system in this country is not the best. High power lines, when energized, can produce OZONE plus radio and other electromagnetic polution. Electrical power lines, like the wiring on our layouts, have voltage drops. Windmills have there own issues.....
I remember that to save trees and forests people need to use plastic bags.....
I am not saying no to electric cars. Just do not make this the plastic bag on 'droids!
At the risk of going off on a non-railroad tangent, the whole idea of saving tress by not using paper is one of the most ridiculous ideas that is spread around these days. It's mostly perpetuated by well-meaning but poorly informed armchair environmentalists and by businesses like banks, who stand to profit by handling less paper. Paper companies grow trees on vast tracts for that specific purpose. They are essentially tree farms. Trying to save those trees is like trying to save corn plants by not eating corn. If all paper was replaced by other materials, or if 100% of our paper was recycled, we would not need raw pulp, and the paper companies would not need those trees. Since they are not in the open space business and would quickly sell those lands, which would not necessarily be preserved. Imagine the irony of attempts to "save trees" resulting in tracts of forest being cut down and developed.
I do agree on the issue of electric cars. They are not the cure-all that so many believe them to be, for the reasons you listed.
Dominic Mazoch posted:Richie C. posted:Dominic Mazoch posted:I just saw on Google an announcement about the station. One car company is going to have to fix or repair daily the station for some time!
Very tricky …….. hopefully, there won't be anyone near the station found on road dead.
....from ex 70's exploding gas tanks!
BTW, to me, electric cars are at this time not the green concept people think they are. Batteries are haz-mats. Our grid system in this country is not the best. High power lines, when energized, can produce OZONE plus radio and other electromagnetic polution. Electrical power lines, like the wiring on our layouts, have voltage drops. Windmills have there own issues.....
I remember that to save trees and forests people need to use plastic bags.....
I am not saying no to electric cars. Just do not make this the plastic bag on 'droids!
It isn't a bad bet, Ford is a global company and even with the mania around Trucks and SUV's in the US, Electric vehicles are gaining traction in other places, BMW just announced growth in electric car sales of like 31%. If the price of gas keeps climbing as it has been......
Electric Power lines as sources of dangerous radiation and the like has been blown out of the water, in Sweden and other places where they take environmental threats seriously (they were the first ones to quantify the risks of CRT displays and other kinds of displays, and the safety standards now in place worldwide came from them) did long term studies of power transmission and they conclusively proved that there wasn't the risk people were claiming. As far as power drops over distance, that has always been a problem with power transmission but hasn't stopped us from having long distance transmission. Yep, our power grid in many ways is a cobbled together mess, but for better or worse it works.
The kinds of batteries they use in cars these days are not going to end up in a landfill, the lithium used in these batteries is a toxic metal as are cadmium (the cad in nicad), lead and other routinely used metals, yet we haven't banned the lead acid battery, because like the LiPo and the like used in electric cars, they get recycled. The real environmental threat is the batteries we use in electric gizmos, the AA,AAA,C, D that often end up tossed in the garbage rather than recycled..and there is zero threat in an electric car from being exposed to the toxic metals (yeah, if a car caught fire you theoretically could breath in particles of that, but guess what, all that wiring and seat materials and paint burning puts out really toxic fumes).
There is serious work going on to basically make electric vehicles infinite range, there has been some breakthrough work done on dynamic recharging (basically, using induction from power in the roadways to recharge batteries as the car is driving), there are some large scale tests going on and it has the potential to make electric vehicles truly practical for all kinds of driving (obviously, would need to work out things like redoing roads to have this embedded, who would pay for it, how to make the technology safe against idiots deciding to dig up cables for the material in them), but it is looking like it may be feasible.
As far as Ford redoing the station, I am glad they are doing it.What they don't need themselves could be used by tech startups, and given what Ford is planning there could be places doing work on the technology needed to make electric cars truly a replacement for the gas engine. I am also glad to see Detroit coming back to life, and that the auto industry, that helped with the decline, is trying to bring it back. I have heard that house prices are going up (not many years ago you could pick up a house for 10k or so), and that artists and musicians are moving into neighborhoods along with other creative people and that is cool. Cities are pretty good for that kind of thing, tends to spur a lot of innovation and change, and Detroit certainly deserves some good news. Only problem with Detroit for me is the weather, them winters are pretty mean (then again, Chicago is a great city and their weather, well...
.
No confirmation from Amtrak, if they will move back in. They have new station at Dearborn, about five miles west of Michigan Central Depot.
Gary: Rail-fan
Attachments
I wonder how the Ford Shareholders will take this since there are millions/Billions to be poured into this project. Ford mustl be getting some type of tax breaks and/or financial assistance from Mich-I -Can and/or the Feds? If the economy slumps and sales dive like a submarine, will Ford stop the renovation?
It's nice thought that they will tackle this Downtown Eyesore and make it into a diamond er... shiny Oval once again!
As a Detroit area resident it was sad to see how the building had been so neglected. Ford on the other hand has long term plans for it's use. I don't think they are gonna dump wheel barrels of money into it overnight. But some day..........
Their plans are long term and are buying other buildings in the same area they definitely have big plans for the future in auto designs.
prrhorseshoecurve posted:I wonder how the Ford Shareholders will take this since there are millions/Billions to be poured into this project. Ford mustl be getting some type of tax breaks and/or financial assistance from Mich-I -Can and/or the Feds? If the economy slumps and sales dive like a submarine, will Ford stop the renovation?
It's nice thought that they will tackle this Downtown Eyesore and make it into a diamond er... shiny Oval once again!
To loosely paraphrase one of the Ford family from many years ago "small cars mean small profit".
Someone smells subsidies in alternative fuel vehicles and technologies and I suspect that someone is Ford. Thus the interest in "alternative fuel and autonomous vehicles" at that location. And one may be certain that there are financial incentives such as tax breaks involved.
As long as those continue, AND they are fruitful and lead to permanent jobs that is good.
Hopefully the station can be repurposed and any issues with the surrounding neighborhoods and blight and crime can be mitigated.
Actually, you have to look at the bigger picture. It's not just battery powered cars and autonomous driving. Its technology evolving to a new level. A change to the way we do business... I am not saying its good nor bad... but this is a dawn of a new era:
No longer will vehicles sit in a rusted junk yard
Reduced traffic fatalities
Reduced emissions
A new development of A.I.
Both mass transportation and personal transportation will be coordinated from one hub
No auto insurance or loans needed
Auto service will be a thing of the past
You might not even need a drivers liscense or register a vehicle...
The list goes on.
All I know is this will be an awakening for this area of Detroit in a positive way.
John I'm excited for Detroit too, there's lots on your list though that I don't see going away in our lifetimes
I was never realy concernd about the effects of radio and electromagnetic sources until I took a test for something. Two FCC tests. These were for the Amateur Radio General and then Extra Class. These tests, along with the Tech, have questions concerning Radio Frequency exposure. Got me to wonder: Does this apply to all radio physics, or does amateur radio alone have odd physics? Somehow the Fox Mulder in me is alerted: What are we not being told?
Also,is this a case of where a little exposure is OK once or twice, but over a period of time....?
And there are places and times where having an all electric transortation system of any kind could make a disaster worse. Places in hurricane zones. The pwer grid is the first to go, unless it is underground. OK, then what happens when the hurricane wants to imitate Harvey over Houston......
Althought he talk is all about the MC station, actually the station is secondary. It's the office building that interests Ford. Taht was built in 1913 as the headquarters of the Michigan Railroad. It was one of NYC's major offices until the PC merger, housing the offices of the Northern District General Manager, the Detroit Division Superintendent and the AVP of the Detroit sales region.
There is some nonsense in teh Wiki article about the location having been chosen to stimulate retail development. The fact is that the station had to be at the end of the grade up from the tunnel under the Detroit River.
trainroomgary posted:superwarp1 posted:Question, where is it stated anywhere Ford wants the building? Maybe they just want the land?
Hi superwarp1
Ford Motor is going to refurbish the station, I would send you more information, but I am on my iPhone. There is a large power outage on my side of town.
Dear Trainroomgary,
The large power outage on your side of town is being caused by all of those transformers you have turned on to run your layout! Please turn them off so some of us little guys can have some fun as well!
I just read that the NE Journal of Medicine did a redaction on the study of the Mediterranean Diet because of sampling errors. And the English Doctor who found this error have found others....
What does this have to do with this thread? Earlier, some posts indicated a study said X. I am not flaming anybody. But it is getting to the point one cannot trust any study, or for that matter, poll.
Rich is right, journalism is dead. Is scholarship next?
Allegheny posted:trainroomgary posted:superwarp1 posted:Question, where is it stated anywhere Ford wants the building? Maybe they just want the land?
Hi superwarp1
Ford Motor is going to refurbish the station, I would send you more information, but I am on my iPhone. There is a large power outage on my side of town.
Dear Trainroomgary,
The large power outage on your side of town is being caused by all of those transformers you have turned on to run your layout! Please turn them off so some of us little guys can have some fun as well!
I'm still waiting on Ford's announcement on this. Why I think it's great. I don't understand why Ford would spend what some estimates have stated a cool 300-400 million to restore this building. Why?
