The building to the southwest of this cache site is the Michigan Central Station (also known as Michigan Central Depot or MCS) and was completed in 1913 for the Michigan Central Railroad. It was originally designed and built to be a replacement for the original building burned on December 26, 1913. After being rushed into service, it was used consistently through it's final train boarding on January 6, 1988. At the time of its construction, it was reported to be the tallest rail station in the world.
March 2012: The view from Windsor. Thanks to swed31 for the photo.
The building is located in the Corktown district of Detroit near the Ambassador Bridge approximately 3/4-mile (1.2 km) southwest of downtown Detroit. It is located behind Roosevelt Park, and the Roosevelt Warehouse is adjacent to the east. The city's Roosevelt Park serves as a grand entry way to the station. The Station was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1975.
MCS under construction
Restoration projects and plans have gone as far as the negotiation process, but none have come to fruition. In 2011, the building was to get new windows but the owner (who also owns the Ambassador Bridge) never followed through. Full restoration of Michigan Central Station would be a large-scale project requiring significant investment of both time and money resources.
Aerial view of the Station with the Ambassador Bridge in the background.
The building is of the Beaux-Arts Classical style of architecture, designed by the Warren & Wetmore and Reed and Stem firms who also designed New York City's Grand Central Terminal. The price tag for this 500,000-square-foot (46,000 m2) building was $15 million when it was built. Roosevelt Park (directly to the north of the building) creates a grand entryway for the station, which was fully realized around 1920.
View with Roosevelt Park In Front, 1921
The building is composed of two distinct parts: the train station itself and the 18-story tower. The roof height is 230 feet (70 m). Ideas as to what the tower was originally designed to include a hotel, offices for the rail company, or a combination of both. In reality, the tower was only used for office space by the Michigan Central Railroad and subsequent owners of the building. The tower was never completely utilized; the top floors were never completely furnished, and served no function.
Cross-section plan of the station
Ground-floor layout plan for the building.
Two photos of the Main Waiting Room
1967 (top) being used for storage.
2010 (bottom) being used for....?
The main waiting room on the main floor was modeled after an ancient Roman bathhouse with walls of marble and vaulted ceilings. The building also housed a large hall adorned with Doric columns that housed the ticket office and an arcade shops. Beyond the arcade was the concourse, which had brick walls and a large copper skylight. From here, passengers would walk down a ramp to the departing train platforms, 11 tracks in all. Below the tracks and building is a large area for baggage and mail handling and offices.
Main Entrance – 1930
The building began operating as Detroit's main passenger depot in 1913 after the older Michigan Central Station burned on December 26, 1913. It was planned as part of a large project that included the Michigan Central Railway Tunnel that runs below the Detroit River for freight and passengers. The old station was located on a spur line which was inconvenient for the volume of passengers it served. The new Michigan Central would place passenger service on the main line.
The Station waiting room, 1913. The centerpiece of the new depot, modeled after an ancient Roman bath.
The growing trend toward increased automobile use was not a large concern in 1912, as is evident in the design of the building. Most passengers would arrive at and leave from Michigan Central Station by interurban streetcar or streetcar and not as pedestrians due to the station's distance from downtown Detroit. The station was placed away from downtown in the hope that the station would be an anchor for development to follow.
Another view from the West
At the beginning of World War I, the peak of rail travel in the United States, more than two hundred trains left the station each day and lines would stretch from the boarding gates to the main entrance. In the 1940s, more than four thousand passengers a day used the station and more than three thousand people worked in its office tower. Among those who arrived at MCS were Presidents Herbert Hoover, Harry S. Truman and Franklin D. Roosevelt, actor Charlie Chaplin and inventor Thomas Edison.
Rush Hour, 1943
Things were looking up as Henry Ford began to buy land near the station in the 1920s and made construction plans, but the Great Depression and other circumstances squelched this and many other development efforts. Further compounding MCS's future problems was the fact that the original design included no large parking facility.
View of one of the upper floors (recent)
So, when the interurban service was discontinued less than two decades after MCS opened, MCS was effectively isolated from a large majority of the population.
The waiting room of Michigan Central Station, 2011
However, even with fewer means to get to and from the station, passenger volume did not decrease immediately. During World War II, the station saw heavy military use, but once the war ended, passenger volume began to decline. Service was cut back and passenger traffic became so low that the owners of the station attempted to sell the facility in 1956 for USD $5 million, one-third of its original building cost in 1913.
1984 interior view
Another attempt to sell the building occurred in 1963, but again there were no buyers. In 1967, maintenance costs were seen as too high relative to the decreasing passenger volume. The restaurant, arcade shops, and main entrance were closed, along with much of the main waiting room. This left only two ticket windows to serve passengers and visitors, who used the same parking-lot entrance as railroad employees working in the building.
The station thrived prior to the Second World War. During the Second World War the rails were crowded with military traffic and the MCS saw many tearful good-byes as soldiers departed for the front. After the Second World War, however, the slow decline began.
Things began to look better for the building when Amtrak took over the nation's passenger rail service in 1971. The main waiting room and entrance were reopened in 1975 and a $1.25 million renovation project began in 1978. But only six years later, the building was sold for a transportation center project that never materialized and on January 6, 1988, the last Amtrak train pulled away from the station after it was decided to close the facility. Amtrak service continued at a platform near the building until a new station opened several miles away in Detroit's "New Center Area" in 1994.
A beautiful night photo of the Station, 2007
In July 1992, the Detroit Master Plan of Policies for the southwest sector's urban design identified the station as an attractive or interesting feature to be recognized, enhanced and promoted.
February, 1986 - Train pulling into Michigan Central Station.
Controlled Terminals Inc. acquired the station in 1996. Its sister company, the Detroit International Bridge Co., owns the nearby Ambassador Bridge and both are part of a group of transportation-related companies owned by businessman Manuel Moroun, Chairman and CEO of CenTra Inc.
The station has also appeared in several films including scenes in the movie "Transformers" (directed by Michael Bay) in October 2006. In January 2005, it was used as a location set for the movie ''The Island" (2005, also directed by Michael Bay).
Scene from the movie "Transformers", 2006
In September 2002, extensive closeups and fly-by shots were featured in the movie ''Naqoyqatsi''. The 2004 film ''Four Brothers'' opens with the main character driving his car along the front of Michigan Central Station towards Michigan Ave. The building has been used in some of musical artist Eminem's work, including the title sequence of the movie ''8 Mile'' and his music video for the song "Beautiful", during the beginning of which the building features prominently. A scene from the ABC crime drama ''Detroit 1-8-7'' was shot and set inside the station.
The City of Detroit considered the building a "Priority Cultural Site" in 2006, in something called the "Non-motorized Urban Transportation Master Plan". The City Council on April 7, 2009 passed a resolution aimed at the demolition of the Depot. Seven days later, Detroit resident Stanley Christmas sued the city of Detroit to stop the demolition effort, citing the "National Historic Preservation Act of 1966". The future of the building remains undetermined.
A view of the interior back in 1987
Please share any of your personal memories & stories of the Station in your logs.
I will do my best to include those in the Cache Page as well.
From DeRock (Reviewer) 3/30/2012:
My father was drafted into the army during the Korean war and this train station was where he left to go to basic training.
Decades later, even though we didn't live in the downstate area, we had a tradition of going to the auto show opening day and afterwards heading up Michigan Ave to Miller's Bar for their world famous burgers (and maybe a beer or two).
Every time we passed the old train station he would recount the story of that fateful day in 1951 and comment what a shame it was that one of the most beautiful buildings in the metro area stood literally in ruins.
From Brummelbear: 3/31/2012:
My story: my Dad left the central coal regions of Pennsylvania in the summer of 1942 to come to Detroit and work in one of the plants that had just been converted to wartime materials production. In the August of 1942, my Dad had found a place for his family to live and sent for my Mother and two older sisters. They travelled by train from Harrisburg, PA, to Buffalo, NY. At Buffalo, they waited on a New York central train that would take them on the journey across Ontario and finally into Detroit. The total trip by rail was over twelve hours. My Father met them at the Michigan Central Station and there began the Detroit era of our family.
From swed31's log on another cache "Bleed Canada Blue" (GC31MEV on 3/11/2012):
A great day for caching along the Detroit River. As I spent a few hours down by the river I was intrigued by that goliath of a building over on the Detroit side. It looks like a massive burned out shell of a structure. It’s both an eye sore and an architectural thing of beauty. I wondered what it was and why it was there. I checked Wikipedia and this is what I found out:
Michigan Central Station, built in mid-1912 through 1913 for the Michigan Central Railroad, was Detroit, Michigan's passenger rail depot from its opening in 1913, until the cessation of Amtrak service on January 6, 1988. At the time of its construction, it was the tallest rail station in the world. At the beginning of World War I, the peak of rail travel in the United States, more than 200 trains left the station each day and lines would stretch from the boarding gates to the main entrance. In the 1940s, more than 4000 passengers a day used the station and more than 3000 people worked in its office tower. Restoration projects and plans have gone as far as the negotiation process, but none have come to fruition. In 2011, the building was to get new windows but the owner never followed through. Full restoration of Michigan Central Station would be a large-scale project requiring significant investment.
Wow!
Would be great if it were someday restored to its former glory. Thanks for bringing me here.
(Picture was added above from this log entry)
From Geocacher Scook's log 02/10/2013:
...Not only have I taken many trains from here but my dad used to work on the 7th floors for years.
There is construction/remodeling going on with the building and
IT IS PRIVATE PROPERTY.
Please do NOT go on the property or in the building.
because it is PRIVATE PROPERTY and the structure
IS NOT SAFE to enter at this time.
Enjoy the Cache...and the view! :)