The never-entirely-used and long-derelict Michigan Central Depot, in the Corktown area west of downtown Detroit, may finally be fully occupied by the unlikeliest of tenants: an Internet advertising company. As representative Amil Amadto reports, "We make Panoramio, a geography-based photo sharing site, and we're behind the technology that runs a lot of smart phones today. And this little 20% project has sort of become the darling of Silicon Valley geeks, it helps you find things on the Internet: we call it Google Search. And of course we're pretty big in advertising - we're practically the RyPN of online ads."

Google's purchase came out of efforts to expand their Ann Arbor office. "The commercial real estate market in Ann Arbor is crazy. Frankly, the Ann Arbor master-planners didn't master-plan for us, and we're being elbowed out by the mighty University of Michigan. So we looked farther out, which would mean shuttle buses. And with all the fuss in San Francisco about our employee shuttles using city bus stops, plus Detroit traffic generally, we were thinking more… non-highway. Also the WALLY train gave us some inspiration, it's got a goofy name like Google. So we followed the rail lines. There just weren't any buildings large enough in Chelsea or Whitmore Lake or Dundee, but when we saw the MC Depot from a distance, we knew we had our site. The G in the D."

Critics note that while you can never quite tell with regional spellings, Detroit is widely believed not to actually have a G in it.

Google has ordered twelve TGV Réseau trainsets, and is trying to convince Alstom to follow their lead and build them in the local Studebaker plant. In the meantime, and while the electrification is completed, they intend to rely on existing commuter train-sets.

They hope to develop some of the area as well, such as walking paths and a baseball diamond.

These two sections almost sound like something you would actually see, particularly about how the University of Michigan would be a big fish at Ann Arbor, and the walking paths and baseball diamond development.

The information railroad byway

Those of us who are into old things on rubber tires as well as flanged wheels probably spotted a bit of bogus data in the item: Studebaker's plant was in South Bend, Indiana. Not sure if any of the buildings are left, but in the South Bend Airport, where today's South Shore electric trains terminate, there a meeting space called the Studebaker Room. And for a railroad connection, I believe that the holding company that wound up with Studebaker' assets also had a piece of Alco Products.

With what remains of Tiger Stadium (already under redevelopment) and some of the best Mexican food outside of Mexico (Mexican Village) both within walking distance if one dares, this would be a dream come true had it not been posted on April Fool's Day.

Nice try, but anyone who has driven in Ann Arbor will have noticed buses painted to look like blue and gold winged helmets and they're free to anyone in town and then there's also AATA which runs one of the best "coach" systems in the country.

Now if you had said Wallyrail to have announced a start in service....

and has been pointed out, what's left of Tiger Stadium (mainly the flag pole and field) is being preserved.

<lol>

Bob H

The current owner of the MC depot (who is the same person who owns the Ambassador Bridge) has contracted with a firm to replace several hundred (but not all) missing windows.

http://archive.freep.com/article/201312 ... -1913-open

Dave

This is the most April Fool's Day Joke I've seen so far. This joke won't fool me

Matty Moroun isn't going to let MCS go that easy, especially to a company like Google. He's already lost the bridge crossing fight with Canada. Canada is going build their new bridge, and he'll lose most of his trucking business to it. Canada's New Bridge will connect directly with 401 with I-75. Matty considers MCS his backup plan. He's really been eying that NYC/MC River Tunnel. CP Rail wants to build a newer/larger tunnel so they can run double stack trains between Chicago-Montreal. Matty wants the old tunnel for truck traffic only. That Man wants a total Monopoly over the Detroit/Windsor cross-border trucking traffic. At this point, Dan Gilbert is the only person that could buy MCS from Mr. Moroun. Here's yesterday Freep news.

Dan Gilbert Announces Ally To Expand In Detroit:
http://www.freep.com/videos/money/busin ... /70736476/

MCS overall is in awful shape and overhauling/restoring won't be easy. As for the building could be, I'm still hoping and holding out that it will be turned back into a train station again + also be a mega transit center for the City Of Detroit.