MC Depot was also used for a chase scene in the 10/5 episode of Detroit 187.

I remember getting off the Lodge M10 near Tiger Stadium and seeing a sign at a church that said "What do I have to do to be saved"

Bob H.

One phrase has stuck in my memory since the `70's from one of the earliest publications of the Society of Industrial Archeology, in which one of their founding authors tried to explain what industrial archeology was. He said that some of it was a study of corporate, engineering, and intellectual history of innovation, but that some stemmed from "a romantic fascination with ruins." I won't deny indulging this fascination, and we've taken what I call "depreciated-assets tours" of railroad and industrial facilities all over the country.

The best of these was a tour of the earliest Detroit auto factories put on by SIA a few years ago, centered on the neighborhood named for the DGH&M's Milwaukee Junction. This neighborhood features a fair amount of ruination, but also the still-working former Fisher Body plant where the Eminem stamping-plant scenes were filmed, just down the street from the rubble field that was the EMF-Studebaker plant and one of my favorite successful (so far) volunteer, low-budget preservation efforts: the Ford Piquette Avenue plant, where the Model T was designed. Ford grew so fast after the Model T entered production that it walked away from this 1905 wood-framed, 4-story factory, leaving it to warehouse use by Ford and Studebaker for the next 50 years. Today the building is intact and unmodified, and contains a laundry and a museum devoted to Ford that is trying to re-create the actual space where the T was engineered.

And finally, just up the street from the Studebaker plant: a railroad overpass still lettered for "Michigan Central" on the north side, away from the sun.

Aarne Frobom
Brush Street, Michigan

Just for the record, becuase it often comes up, National Register listing does not prevent a private property owner from demolishing a building using private resources to do it--in fact, that happens a few times every year, year in and year out.

It does limit public agencies that receive Federal funds from underwriting the demolition, and it may effect a demolition/redevelopment project's eligibility for favorable tax treatments.

But if you use only your own money to hire the wreckers, and don't want any future tax breaks, anything goes.

Does anyone here think using these ruins as backdrops for various movies and music videos helps to focus attention on the plight or condition of the historic properties shown? Maybe I missed it but they seem careful to avoid any signage...

Stephen

PS - Just for the record, early Eminem MUCH better...

I imagine that the movie and television crews have to pay to shoot at the Michigan Central Depot. I wonder what happens to the money.

The location fees are likely used to pay the property taxes...and perhaps plywood, chain link fencing and a lock or two.

Stephen

Now I havent read the act, but...

It sounds like a contradiction, but it isn't necessarily.

In this case, Detroit Mayor Kenneth Cockrel Jr. wanted to use $3.6 million in federal stimulus money to fund the demolition. It was the attempt to use Federal funding that opened the city to a lawsuit to enjoin demolition under the National Historic Preservation Act.

I'm not trying to be contentious--really. I'm just pointing out, because some folks reading might not know, that private owners can demolish listed properties. So can public agencies under many circumstances. You just can't do it very easily with Federal money.