# Detroit?



## Lucky13 (Jul 20, 2013)

How did Detroit go bankrupt?? Once such a proud city, Motown and the Big Three...
Didn't even know cities could go bankrupt, apparently she's the biggest city in US history to do so...

Such a shame....


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## syscom3 (Jul 20, 2013)

The manufacturing base went away. That is the root of it all. No assembly plants = no jobs and no tax base.


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## DerAdlerIstGelandet (Jul 20, 2013)

Manufacturing base went away, corrupt officials, the good people leave, and now the city is overrun with criminals.

A city I never care to see...


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## GrauGeist (Jul 21, 2013)

Detroit has been in a downward spiral for quite some time. High crime, high unemployment, corrupt city government...it's one of the worst cities in the U.S.


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## Wayne Little (Jul 21, 2013)




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## evangilder (Jul 21, 2013)

The other guys summed it up. This has been coming for quite some time. There are entire websites set up to abandoned neighborhoods of Detroit. There are neighborhoods that have no water, electricity or gas running into them because no one lives there. It's sad.


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## Lucky13 (Jul 21, 2013)

Wow! I'm shocked guys!!


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## evangilder (Jul 21, 2013)

It's not the first city in the US to go bankrupt, but it is the largest so far. San Bernardino recently did here in California. Look for more of this to happen as pension funds start sucking the well dry.


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## GrauGeist (Jul 21, 2013)

City of Stanton, in Orange County (SoCal) went bankrupt in the early 80's...they had to dissolve thier city services like the Police and Fire departments as well as other departments. Orange County fire and the Sherrif's department took over services while private contractors were awarded service contracts to maintain infrastructure for the city's residents.


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## B-17engineer (Jul 21, 2013)

Watched a documentary on the Detroit fire Department, they get so many houses burned down for insurance claims there and various other fraudulent activities


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## vikingBerserker (Jul 21, 2013)

I had heard on NPR that you could fit the city of LA or San Francisco in the dead areas of Detroit.


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## evangilder (Jul 21, 2013)

This one is interesting. Some of these homes were quite something in their day.
100 Abandoned Houses


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## evangilder (Jul 21, 2013)

This one too:
Detroit in ruins | Art and design | The Observer


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## Lucky13 (Jul 21, 2013)

• An estimated 40% of the city's street lights didn't work in the first quarter of 2013.

• Roughly 78,000 city structures have been abandoned.

A bit out of date I think, but...

Detroit's Beautiful, Horrible Decline - Photo Essays - TIME


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## vikingBerserker (Jul 21, 2013)

It's what happens when people refuse to deal with reality.


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## Lucky13 (Jul 21, 2013)

Honestly guys, still find it hard to take in, doesn't really register.....what a shame, what a waste!


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## GrauGeist (Jul 21, 2013)

Detroit also has the highest violent crime rate in the nation:
Last year saw 411 murders, 432 rapes, 4,962 robberies, 9,525 assaults, 15,997 burgleries, 16,543 thefts and 11,415 vehicle thefts...

According to the statistics, there are roughly 414 crimes per square mile on average, your chances of having something stolen from you in Detroit is 1 in 16...your chances of being a victim of violent crime: 1 in 46

Yeah, a real nice place, isn't it?


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## Lucky13 (Jul 21, 2013)

Saw that over the nation, in general, you could wait for the Police for 11 minutes, in Detroit....58 minutes!!


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## GrauGeist (Jul 21, 2013)

yeah...and that's if they respond at all...

Alot of large U.S. cities have terrible response times for police


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## ccheese (Jul 21, 2013)

I just have to wonder how much the owners of Toyotas, Hondas, Nissans, Hyundai's and other Japanese cars contributed to Detroit's downfall.

Charles


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## DerAdlerIstGelandet (Jul 21, 2013)

GrauGeist said:


> yeah...and that's if they respond at all...
> 
> Alot of large U.S. cities have terrible response times for police



And thats why I own firearms...


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## vikingBerserker (Jul 21, 2013)

Considering how many are now built in the US probably not as much as one would think. I personally hated dealing with the Big Three and the Teir 1 suppliers as their approach was always adversarial whereas Toyota and Honda was approach was a lot more friendly and helpful.

Half of Detroit's issues I think were the Big 3 and their Unions running a business by being bullies which is not the way you want to do it, and unfortunately they are now paying the price.


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## Marcel (Jul 21, 2013)

ccheese said:


> I just have to wonder how much the owners of Toyotas, Hondas, Nissans, Hyundai's and other Japanese cars contributed to Detroit's downfall.
> 
> Charles


that's a free market for you.


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## Lucky13 (Jul 21, 2013)

Might get the numbers wrong here, using the wee gray ones, but....wasn't Detroit up in 1,700 000 inhabitants back in the 50's and are now down to below 700,000?


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## GrauGeist (Jul 21, 2013)

vikingBerserker said:


> Considering how many are now built in the US probably not as much as one would think. I personally hated dealing with the Big Three and the Teir 1 suppliers as their approach was always adversarial whereas Toyota and Honda was approach was a lot more friendly and helpful.
> 
> Half of Detroit's issues I think were the Big 3 and their Unions running a business by being bullies which is not the way you want to do it, and unfortunately they are now paying the price.


Agree...

With the successive strikes and escelating retail prices while quality control declined during the late 70's - early 80's, the Japanese imports were able to get thier foot in the door.

Add to that AMC going down (even though Chrysler bought them out) which left a good deal of people unemployed and vendors having to downsize in AMC's absence.

On the upside, Japan's automakers have quite a few models that are manufactured here in North America (Toyota, Nissan, Honda and Mitsubishi all have plants here)


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## Lucky13 (Jul 21, 2013)

Detroit's amazing transformation captured on camera after it loses ONE MILLION residents in 60 years | Mail Online


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## DerAdlerIstGelandet (Jul 21, 2013)

Lucky13 said:


> Might get the numbers wrong here, using the wee gray ones, but....wasn't Detroit up in 1,700 000 inhabitants back in the 50's and are now down to below 700,000?



Yeap the crime has driven more and more of the decent people out.

I think they should put a fence around Detroit.


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## Lucky13 (Jul 21, 2013)

Must have been some city though, back in its glory days and later with the Motown sound...


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## Njaco (Jul 21, 2013)

I don't want to get too political but its what happens when you have only one party in control of government for over 50 years.


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## swampyankee (Jul 21, 2013)

I think the downturn started with the riots in the late 1960s (there were riots all over the place, but those in Detroit seemed to be particularly destructive), but Detroit's recovery was largely precluded by the conditions of the US auto industry: poor design, poor quality, and generally poor products.

I've heard, on NPR, that some of abandoned property in Detroit is being returned to agriculture, as it costs less than farmland in the surrounding part of Michigan. Personally, I think that the more distant suburbs will start having the same sort of collapse in the future when road fuel starts hitting $8 or $9/gallon, which will happen regardless of fever dreams about miracles from ANWR or whatever.


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## syscom3 (Jul 21, 2013)

This happened in the westerns towns that went to ruin after the mines gave out.

Nothing new.

Move along folks. History is repeating itself.


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## GrauGeist (Jul 22, 2013)

Well, yeah and no...the gold, silver and timber towns were "boom" towns usually with a transient population. The city of Old Shasta here in Shasta county was the county seat during the late 1800's and boasted of a population of about 14,000 people...today, it has a population of about 200. Same could be said for Silverado in east Orange County that was a gold camp until silver was discovered. Once the silver was gone, so were the residents.

The difference between these towns and the city of Detroit, is that Detroit wasn't an overnight sensation. It grew from an Indian village into a metropolis over time. It has (or rather, had) infrastructure that under normal conditions, would perpetuate the city's existance. It has been mis-management that has pushed the city into disaster, not the decline of nearby natural resources.


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## swampyankee (Jul 22, 2013)

The number I heard on the news the other evening was that Detroit lost about 90% of its manufacturing jobs. We can rail against government regulations, unions, local government, and what-have-you, but it there was not just one guilty party: it was a confluence of all these, with the Arab Oil Embargo setting a match to the fuze.

Rumor I've heard is that some US auto executives will tell you, in private, after a few single malts, that the CAFE standards saved them: their corporate culture was so attached to heavy, high-powered, inefficient vehicles that they would have kept going down the path to oblivion.


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## Matt308 (Jul 22, 2013)

From Business Insider

•Detroit's population has plunged 63% since 1950.
•...and it's down 26% since 2000.
•The unemployment rate hit a high of 27.8% in July 2009.
•As of April 2013, the unemployment rate was at 16%.
•Even though the population fell 63% since 1950, the municipal workforce fell by just 40%, adding to the strain on public finances.
•Detroit has the highest violent crime rate of any large U.S. city
•...it's five times higher than the national average.
•40% of the city's street lights don't work.
•78,000 structures and 66,000 lots are abandoned.
•Arson accounts for 1,000 of 12,0000 fires per year.
•...60% of those arson fires are in dilapidated or empty buildings.

Read that again. •Arson accounts for 1,000 of *12,0000* fires per year.



Read more: Depressing Detroit Statistics - Business Insider


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## Lucky13 (Jul 22, 2013)




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## razor1uk (Jul 22, 2013)

Detroit and its fall is similar to the failure of the British motorcycle industry - in reality had very little to do with the Japanese companies; they're just the poster on the door you see as it shuts.

But more to do with blinkered idealism ego, the self viewed superiority of companies, unions and improper design concepts, that and the spreading crime (unorganised) organised crime (corrupted governmental, police official persons) certainly haven't helped it out since - like the close of Rover in B'ham by BWM, and the effects of the areas that worked at the Longbridge Rover Plant.just the poster on the door you see as it shuts.

CC, Hyundai are your (General Motor/GM related I believe) South Koeran Allies, like Daiwoo was before Chevy bourght them out, of which, some of the Daiwoo cars seem based on old 80's/90's Toyotas. Also of which, Toyota is joint or part co-owned by GM, Mazda by Ford etc...


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## Glider (Jul 22, 2013)

All can say is that I went to Detroit abut 10 years ago and it was pretty rough then, what it must be like now I can only hate to think. My heart goes out to the average Joe who wants to do a days work for a days pay. Life must be really really tough.


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## Njaco (Jul 22, 2013)

I can only say that this is happening all over America - not just Detroit. have you ever been to Camden, NJ? or Newark, NJ? or South Central? or how about that hot-bed of disappearing women, Cleveland, Ohio? Detroit will not be the first.


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## DerAdlerIstGelandet (Jul 22, 2013)

I say put a fence around it, to keep all the worthless gangbangers in. Have s checkpoint to let the innocents out. Then encourage the scum to kill each other off.


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## evangilder (Jul 22, 2013)

25 Facts About The Fall Of Detroit That Will Leave You Shaking Your Head

Interesting read. The problem now is that these pension funds are underwater and a lot of other cities are dangerously close to the same situation.


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## Shortround6 (Jul 22, 2013)

swampyankee said:


> Rumor I've heard is that some US auto executives will tell you, in private, after a few single malts, that the CAFE standards saved them: their corporate culture was so attached to heavy, high-powered, inefficient vehicles that they would have kept going down the path to oblivion.



Some of us can remember the US "economy" cars of the early 60s. given the choice of options Detroit seemed to say "You want a _small_ car? you must want rubber floor mats, cardboard door liners, cheap upholstery and really bad performance from a 3-3/1/2 liter six with a carburetor that could use a quarter as a choke plate." If you wanted a better quality interior you had to buy a bigger car. 
I remember shopping for a new car in 1972, Ford Pinto started at just about 2,000 dollars. hub caps were extra, bumper guards were extra, rugs were extra, passenger side mirror was extra , radio was extra, and so it went. You could add hundreds of dollars to the car just to get it up to a decent standard. Went to Toyota dealer, Got a Corolla SR-5 ( first year) for 2500 dollars. Hundreds less than equivalent Pinto. 

one reason Japanese cars were cheaper than American cars was labor, the labor of assembling and keeping track of all the options. Back in 1970 somebody estimated that GM could build 1 million cars, no two the same if the option sheets were filled out right. The Japanese just standardized the cars a lot more. Just a few option packages and a few colors, Much simpler to build and much, much simpler to inventory. 
Also in 1970 American Motors standardized air conditioning on their largest car (the Ambassador ) and dropped the price 100 dollars. It cut the number of possible combinations of options in 1/2, it also meant EVERY car on that production line got air conditioning with a simplification in dash construction, ducts, engine brackets, pully's and belts. 

American pricing was such that the dealer had different profit margins on the options than he did the basic car and could make more profit on the options alone than on the basic car.


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## evangilder (Jul 23, 2013)

I remember that craziness. The list of options was humungous and you could really increase the pricing with it. Hard to imagine now having to pay extra for the passenger side mirror, and seeing lots of cars with mismatch side mirrors because after market ones were way cheaper. That is part of the demise of the city, coupled with some horrible mismanagement.

I remember when Lockheed left Burbank, CA. For a while, the city kind of stagnated, then with proper management and incentives for the studios, Burbank is back to thriving. Granted, it's not like the heydays, but it is still better off than a lot of the surrounding communities that have really gone to hell. Some of the neighborhoods I remember being kind of shady are nice now. Detroit's demise is not completely the auto maker's faults.


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## Lucky13 (Jul 23, 2013)

Come to think of it, like Lockheed and Burbank....
Where I used to live in Sweden, where my parents still, Östersund..
We used to have an air force base, fighter wing, an artillery and one infantry regiment, military schools the lot, now it's all gone.
Well, we were all worried what was going to happen. As it is, the army and air force barracks are not allowed to be pulled down, as they're listed.
Nowadays they're offices, schools etc., etc....
So far, I think that we're, they're doing good...

Hope for the best for Detroit, she deserves it...


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## evangilder (Jul 23, 2013)

To be honest, Jan, I think Detroit is in serious trouble and may not recover, or it will take many years to. Some of the most incredible homes that once graced the higher class neighborhoods have been burned down or bulldozed as have some of the cities landmarks. It should serve as a warning to other cities that are being mismanaged. Unfortunately, few are paying attention. It'll happen again, it's only a matter of time.


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## Shortround6 (Jul 23, 2013)

A major problem with American politics and thus government planning is that most planning/budgeting is either one year or to the next election, so short term savings (lower taxes _this year_) are often bought with higher long term costs. 

That and _every_ politician (or would be politician) who can come up the price of a batch of bumper stickers claims HE/SHE _knows_ how to provide more services for less money _before_ the election.


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## vikingBerserker (Jul 23, 2013)

Shortround6 said:


> A major problem with American politics and thus government planning is that most planning/budgeting is either one year or to the next election, so short term savings (lower taxes _this year_) are often bought with higher long term costs.
> 
> That and _every_ politician (or would be politician) who can come up the price of a batch of bumper stickers claims HE/SHE _knows_ how to provide more services for less money _before_ the election.



A FRICKEN-MEN!!!!!!!!!!!!


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## Lucky13 (Jul 23, 2013)

Some areas must be like ghost towns....?


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## syscom3 (Jul 23, 2013)

Pittsburg successfully navigated the downsizing of the steel industry. And so must Detroit embrace the fact that auto manufacturing is not coming back. The city must downsize. And the state of Michigan (and other rust belt states) must change their antiquated labor codes to reflect the here and now of the economy, and not of a century ago.


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## razor1uk (Jul 23, 2013)

Stagnation, ignorance delusions of grandeur = demise + crime lowering population = things need to change with conviction, transparency and hopes for the future that do not rely on false promises and egomaniacs.
Good luck Detroit and remember, its not quite "..you have 20 seconds to comply!" just yet.


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## Shortround6 (Jul 23, 2013)

You also have to balance what people expect from city services today and what they cost to what was expected 40-50 years ago. 
You can have cheap city services as long as your expectations are low. 40-50 years ago city Ambulances just threw the patient on a stretcher (with minimal bandaging if they were bleeding) and drove like He** for the hospital. No drugs for stroke or heart attack victims in the field. Little or no spinal immobilization for accident victims, no IVs to keep fluids (blood pressure) up. 
Firefighters often had no breathing apparatus so fires were fought from the outside= more foundations saved. 
If a city was shut down by snow for a day or two, well, it was winter. 
Now everybody wants first rate _MODERN_ medical care, first rate fire fighting ( and accident response, Hurst tools and the like), Next to no delay in snow removal and so on. It all costs money. And the people who provide those services would like to make a living wage, like be able to live in/close to the city they work? Not qualify for free school lunches for their kids if the wife is not working, Not have to suit up and climb 3 steps onto a fire truck at age 65 because the pension su**s (lets face it, do YOU really want a pair of 65 year old firemen trying to drag YOU or a loved one OUT of a burning building?) 

And not funding pension programs for years and then claiming cities can't afford pensions they signed onto years earlier ( saved tax dollars for those years they didn't put money in the pension fund didn't they) doesn't sit well.


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## Lucky13 (Jul 23, 2013)

Rust Belt??


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## Matt308 (Jul 23, 2013)

Geographical iron industry locations in US.

And shortround... local garbage workers recently went on strike here. On average they make over $90k/year. That's a damn good living for driving a recycle/garbage truck. Job qualifications? Over 18, highschool diploma or equivalent, pass a urine analysis and no driving under the influence violations. And these gents never have to lift a finger. It's all automated. Pretty damn cushy if you ask me.


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## B-17engineer (Jul 23, 2013)

Thats the problem, there's no such thing as the "American Dream" anymore everyone believes they're all entitled to things instead of working for them.


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## Shortround6 (Jul 23, 2013)

Matt308 said:


> Geographical iron industry locations in US.
> 
> And shortround... local garbage workers recently went on strike here. On average they make over $90k/year. That's a damn good living for driving a recycle/garbage truck. Job qualifications? Over 18, highschool diploma or equivalent, pass a urine analysis and no driving under the influence violations. And these gents never have to lift a finger. It's all automated. Pretty damn cushy if you ask me.



Sounds good to me, I retired after 33 years at under $72K/year pay, not pension. That included all over time and bonuses. We had a guy back in the 90s with 2 kids and wife not working, if he quit his part time job he would have qualified for free school lunches. for the kids. Sometimes unions are a problem and sometimes they are not. Like to guess what the town wanted us to work for  

Thing is somebody on the town side has to agree or for Fire/police it goes to binding arbitration ( no strikes/no lockouts).


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## Njaco (Jul 23, 2013)

You guys are making me sick. We have to keep the politics down but Detroit's problem as is with all the rest of America is nobody votes anymore. I believe that the highest percentage of those able to vote in an election and actually do is around 30%. Its these career politicians who greedily destroy things - and that comment is meant to be bi-partisan.


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## syscom3 (Jul 23, 2013)

Lucky13 said:


> Rust Belt??



That's a term used to describe the old industrial and manufacturing cities of the midwest and northeast states. Principally Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York and Massachusetts.

Many of the factories started closing up in the 70's and 80's as globalization caught up with them exposing quality, cost and efficiency deficiencies. And some of them simply closed up because of changing technologies and consumer tastes.

As it pertains to auto manufacturing; its several fold in complexity. You had the American manufacturers making horrible quality cars that drove (no pun intended) customers to foreign makes. Then you have a unionized workforce with their collective heads stuck in an era when there was no competition, and the resultant labor immobility and inefficiencies. And then factor in on how poorly the management was, for 50 years or more.

Now whats screwed for Detroit, is when a new assembly plant is built, it isnt in that city at all. The jobs when created now, are elsewhere. And that goes for the state of Michigan and the other "rust belt" states.

Rust Belt or not. Factories all have limited lifespans. You have to invest in them from time to time to bring them to modern technological standards and keep them efficient. Or they will slowly "rust" over time and eventually become obsolescent, then obsolete and be shut down.


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## davparlr (Jul 23, 2013)

Shortround6 said:


> Some of us can remember the US "economy" cars of the early 60s. given the choice of options Detroit seemed to say "You want a small car? you must want rubber floor mats, cardboard door liners, cheap upholstery and really bad performance from a 3-3/1/2 liter six with a carburetor that could use a quarter as a choke plate." If you wanted a better quality interior you had to buy a bigger car.



I don’t agree with you fully here. In 1960 the US auto industry delivered three solid compact cars, the Corvair, the Falcon, and the Valiant. These were very basic automobiles with limited niceties, but so were the foreign cars at the time such as the technologically simple VW (it had no gas gage). The Valiant was probably one the best cars ever built (if you can get by the ugliness of the Exner designed first three years). Combine the slant six, especially the 225 CI one, with the torqueflite, you have a peppy little car with recognized durability. I owned an upgraded compact, a 1963 Oldsmobile F-85 Station Wagon which had equal plushness of the 63 Olds 88 we had owned. It had 185 hp 215 CI aluminum V8, which later became the Rover 3.5 liter V8, and hydramatic transmission. It was a nice car. I bought my son a 1965 Corvair and with its Corvette-like independent rear suspension, it tracked like it was on rails with little body lean. If you want a cheap fun car, get a 65+ corvair with the 140 hp engine and four speed. In 1964, with the advent of the Mustang and GTO, American car industry entered its exciting phase that I was a privileged to participate in. In my opinion, the American automobile reached its peak in style and performance in the later part of the 60s. In the early seventies it started to collapse.



> I remember shopping for a new car in 1972, Ford Pinto started at just about 2,000 dollars. hub caps were extra, bumper guards were extra, rugs were extra, passenger side mirror was extra , radio was extra, and so it went. You could add hundreds of dollars to the car just to get it up to a decent standard. Went to Toyota dealer, Got a Corolla SR-5 ( first year) for 2500 dollars. Hundreds less than equivalent Pinto.



All of these things are true but it wasn’t what killed American auto industry. People were nameplate loyal going into the 70’s, but quality collapsed due to poor management and greed. I am sure you would have found that Toyota much more reliable than the Pinto. Due to poor quality, the American automobile lost its owner loyalty which it has never gained back. Had it not done this, the American public would have stuck with Detroit iron. As proof of this, look at the medium truck business. The best selling vehicle in the US is a Ford truck, Chevy and Ram are right behind. Toyota and Nissan trucks in this category, with excellent vehicles, are struggling, barely making a dent in this very profitable line. That is because the American truck manufacturers never lost their owner loyalty, meeting or exceeding their expectations. A Ford truck owner, is a Ford truck buyer, so too for Chevy and Ram. Oldsmobile owners used to be Olds buyers, but no more, in fact there are no more Olds. This happened to me.

In my opinion, the root of the collapse of the American automobile business was greed on the part of Unions and greed, incompetence, and arrogance on the part of management.



> Sometimes unions are a problem and sometimes they are not. Like to guess what the town wanted us to work for



Yes. I am a product of unions. My dad was a fireman/engineer on the railroad, throwing coal into the belly of the beast, and before the unions they could work you to death for little or nothing. Unions let them have a life and a living. Unfortunately too many unions have become greedy and some socialistic. Management have always been greedy.


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## swampyankee (Jul 24, 2013)

Actually, if you look at Consumer Reports (which has problems with its statistics -- it frequently rated a car with an American nameplate much worse than the same car, coming off the same production line, as much worse than the _mechanically identical_ "Japanese" variant), Honda, Toyota, and Datsun were consistently worse than American cars until well into the 1970s. (a friend had his Corolla throw a rod....) They improved, largely because their management invested in plant, employee training, and engineering while the US companies invested in ... what did they invest in? Do note that at this time, Japanese labor was not notably cheaper than US labor, Japanese companies pretty universally worked on employment for life, and Japanese workers do not work in slave-like conditions. On the other hand, Japanese companies are not responsible for employee health benefits (I don't know the details of the Japanese system; I believe that it is, overall, similar to the systems in Germany, Switzerland, Taiwan, and the Scandinavian countries, where everybody gets health insurance but hospitals are not government-owned and operated and physicians and surgeons are not government employees).


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## davparlr (Jul 24, 2013)

Into the 1970s American and Japanese automobile manufacturers were heading in different directions. While the Japanese were revolutionizing build quality, American manufacturing, baffled by by emission and safety standards, were driven by bean counters to keep the bottom line up by accepting lower quality standards.


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## Readie (Jul 28, 2013)

syscom3 said:


> Pittsburg successfully navigated the downsizing of the steel industry. And so must Detroit embrace the fact that auto manufacturing is not coming back. The city must downsize. And the state of Michigan (and other rust belt states) must change their antiquated labor codes to reflect the here and now of the economy, and not of a century ago.



What did JFK say?
Ask not what your country can do for you
Ask what you can do for your country

True then and even more so in 2013 in America and here in the UK. The culture of entitlement has run its course....


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## GrauGeist (Jul 28, 2013)

I remember seeing the horrible quality of American cars in the late 70's and early 80's. An example would be the Chevy Vega, which actually had a good start in it's model life, but was plagued with problems later on. My neighbor bought a '77 wagon and within a year, the paint was peeling off in large sheets and to make matters worse, the bearings in the engine were failing. He spent a great deal of time at the dealer trying to get it warranty repaired, but had little success. Eventually it threw a rod on the freeway and he just left it there...he was so ed. That was less than 3 years after he bought it...


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## Njaco (Jul 28, 2013)

Quality problems still exist today. While engines are longer lived, the cars themselves fall apart. While not exactly US made, a friend of mine bought a BMW brand new and within 2 years the windshield moulding had rotted. They wanted $1800 to fix. This was 3 years ago. He let it go and bought a Mustang.


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## Readie (Jul 28, 2013)

Njaco said:


> Quality problems still exist today. While engines are longer lived, the cars themselves fall apart. While not exactly US made, a friend of mine bought a BMW brand new and within 2 years the windshield moulding had rotted. They wanted $1800 to fix. This was 3 years ago. He let it go and bought a Mustang.



That's usual for a BMW. It must have been a rogue car or older than 'brand new' after shipping and storage in damp conditions.
BMW's are not associated with rusting here, they are not perfect mind with electrical issues and some cylinder head problems.


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## Readie (Jul 28, 2013)

If you want to see a long slow slide into oblivion look no further than British Leyland and the British motorcycle industry, oh yes and ship building, steel making .....
Quite depressing.


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## Njaco (Jul 28, 2013)

really, is anything made of quality anymore? Not many things I have found....


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## GrauGeist (Jul 28, 2013)

A friend of mine years ago, had a MG. He loved that little car but used to say terrible things about the English and their wiring. 

Of course, the wiring on my '79 BMW 320i was not much better...


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## swampyankee (Jul 28, 2013)

A story about the Vega's design and development process. I hope this is apocryphal, but...

During the Vega's development, cars were driven around a test track. If parts failed too soon, they were beefed up, and if the predicted failure time was too long, they were shaved down or they used lower strength materials or cheaper processing. Design life was 50,000 miles, and the goal was to get the car, like the one-horse shay, to collapse into a pile of powder at 50,000.0001 miles. Ford, with the Pinto did not do anything quite so obvious, but the engineers at Ford officially told management that the Pinto's gas tank would burst in a minor rear-end collision, and the likelihood of a serious fire was quite high. The managers decided that the cost -- about $5 -- too much: it would be cheaper to deal with the wrongful death lawsuits.


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## GrauGeist (Jul 28, 2013)

The irony of the Pinto and it's fuel tank, was that the placement was no different than the Maverick (Comet)/Mustang (Falcon) and no more susceptible to bursting into flames than most other cars in a comparable collision. The media hype that revolved around that was similiar to Nader's crusade againt the Corvair in it's mythical rollover abilities...which in all my years turning wrenches, had never seen.


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## Readie (Jul 28, 2013)

Njaco said:


> really, is anything made of quality anymore? Not many things I have found....



No, not for joe public... Some are better than others but, most have flaws. look at JD Power.
.
The only 'quality'motorcycles I have seen are specials like Rickman and Dresda. They use the best components available, but they were niche market machines.


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## Readie (Jul 28, 2013)

GrauGeist said:


> A friend of mine years ago, had a MG. He loved that little car but used to say terrible things about the English and their wiring.
> 
> Of course, the wiring on my '79 BMW 320i was not much better...



The MG, Jaguar, Triumph sports cars were a lost opportunity in America. They simply were not built well enough.


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## Lucky13 (Jul 28, 2013)

Not Detroit but, one of my best friends favourite bikes are those old classic Dunstall Nortons....


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## Readie (Jul 28, 2013)

Lucky13 said:


> Not Detroit but, one of my best friends favourite bikes are those old classic Dunstall Nortons....



I forgot Dunstall Jan, but that is another example of the best of the best.


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## Lucky13 (Jul 28, 2013)

Excellent quality and, if i remember correctly, one of the fastest bikes in the world back in the day....


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## Readie (Jul 28, 2013)

Lucky13 said:


> Excellent quality and, if i remember correctly, one of the fastest bikes in the world back in the day....



Dunstall make Suzuki's handle and go like **** too.
That would be a classic bike to cherish if you can find one.


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## Lucky13 (Jul 28, 2013)

Droooool!!


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## Shortround6 (Jul 28, 2013)

GrauGeist said:


> The irony of the Pinto and it's fuel tank, was that the placement was no different than the Maverick (Comet)/Mustang (Falcon) and no more susceptible to bursting into flames than most other cars in a comparable collision. The media hype that revolved around that was similiar to Nader's crusade againt the Corvair in it's mythical rollover abilities...which in all my years turning wrenches, had never seen.



Nader was a technological illiterate. But then so was much of his readership/membership. He had a drawing in the book showing the swing axle dropping to 38 degrees ( if memory serves) but it would _only_ do that if the shock absorber snapped in half or broke free of it's mount on either end. Something he failed to mention. What he also failed to mention was (or was fooled by a Ford Falcon propaganda film) was that by the time a Corvair reached enough speed to leave the curve traveling backwards, it competitors had already plowed straight off the curve going forward at a lower speed. 

Since the media of the time (and even now) barely had/has enough mechanical know-how to plug in an electric type writer ( or their cell phones). See the great "unintended acceleration by Audi's" fiasco.


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## Readie (Jul 28, 2013)

Yes, lovely bike Jan.
The frame looks like a featherbed to me....


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## Lucky13 (Jul 28, 2013)

Aye.... Featherbed frame indeed!


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## Lucky13 (Jul 28, 2013)




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## Readie (Jul 29, 2013)

Still a bench mark for handling.


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## Lucky13 (Jul 29, 2013)

Agree...


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## swampyankee (Jul 29, 2013)

From Detroit to motorcycles?

OK: anecdote time. A number of the techs I worked with when I was a test engineer were bikers. Nary a one had a good thing to say about Harleys, especially the one who walked into a Harley dealership and found pans under the bikes in the showroom to catch the oil dripping out of the engines. At the time (late 1970s/early 1980s), Harley's build quality stunk. One of the engineers I worked with had worked at Harley and he would relate that Harley did _no_ technical product development. This is why the Japanese bikes were eating Harley's lunch until there was some protectionist legislation passed, essentially to keep Harley afloat.


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## Lucky13 (Jul 29, 2013)

Just a wee breather.... 

Just _WHAT_ was it that made the Big Three end up in, choose, or whatever we can call it, Detroit??


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## Shortround6 (Jul 29, 2013)

I am not sure the "BIG 3" choose it to begin with, in the sense that the companies that became the "BIG 3" started small and were just a few of the hundreds of car makers distributed over a number of states. In the 1910s-20s-30s being close to suppliers/transport helped. The Great Lakes offering cheap transport of steel and some other raw materials. Most of the early engineers were actually somewhat self taught so if you wanted to learn the Industry you went were the Industry was. I think the "BIG 3" just sort of evolved in Detroit.


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## Readie (Jul 29, 2013)

swampyankee said:


> From Detroit to motorcycles?
> 
> OK: anecdote time. A number of the techs I worked with when I was a test engineer were bikers. Nary a one had a good thing to say about Harleys, especially the one who walked into a Harley dealership and found pans under the bikes in the showroom to catch the oil dripping out of the engines. At the time (late 1970s/early 1980s), Harley's build quality stunk. One of the engineers I worked with had worked at Harley and he would relate that Harley did _no_ technical product development. This is why the Japanese bikes were eating Harley's lunch until there was some protectionist legislation passed, essentially to keep Harley afloat.



AMF years...not the best. HD's big trick was playing the heritage card and getting people all over the world to buy into the American dream motorcycle and life style. It was a marketing master stroke.. and still is. Where else would people pay £10k for a bike and then spend a fortune to make it run properly and sound like a Harley?

I wish Triumph,, Norton and BSA had been as clever.


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## GrauGeist (Jul 29, 2013)

If you look at the location of Michigan, you'll see it's centrally located in the nation, with close access to the Great Lakes, trans-continental railroads, nearby sources for steel and coal (coke) for the steel mills and of course, water for those mills. Detroit wasn't the only location for automaking, they were all over the state like Dearborn, Willow Run, Flint, Lansing, etc...


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## syscom3 (Jul 29, 2013)

throughout the 60's and into the 70's; the "big three" was actually the "big 3 and a half". AMC was still around until it was absorbed by Chrysler.

One factor in the decay of Detroit was due to the old age and obsolescence of the factories there. In the 60's and 70's when new factories were built, it went to outlying areas and not in Detroit proper. It was just a matter of time before those factories that went in during the 20's - 50's were abandoned and left to rot.


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## swampyankee (Jul 29, 2013)

..or maybe "Big Three" and nine-sixteents. Studebaker was still around, although I think it was in the corporate equivalent of hospice.


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## GrauGeist (Jul 29, 2013)

Kaiser-Jeep struggled until 1970 and was bought by AMC


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## Shortround6 (Jul 30, 2013)

swampyankee said:


> ..or maybe "Big Three" and nine-sixteents. Studebaker was still around, although I think it was in the corporate equivalent of hospice.



Studebaker was done after 1963 in the US and 65 in Canada. The Avanti went on as a separate company in very small scale production.


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## vikingBerserker (Jul 30, 2013)

The Avanti's always looked odd to me.

I believe all the remaining AMC Eagles now reside in Western NC.


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## swampyankee (Jul 31, 2013)

vikingBerserker said:


> The Avanti's always looked odd to me.
> 
> I believe all the remaining AMC Eagles now reside in Western NC.



The Avanti did look odd. Studebaker was an interesting company, and it certainly foundered in its last decade or so of existence. Packard also foundered after ww2.


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## Njaco (Aug 1, 2013)

I thought the Avanti was so far ahead of its time and much more practical - from a design standpoint - than some of the other crap that was coming out of Detroit in the early 60s. Some of the worst looking cars in the world are from the early 60s - at least until the new millennium where everything looks like a diamond cut suppository.


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## swampyankee (Aug 2, 2013)

Love the phrase "diamond cut suppository." 

I have a severe dislike of tailfins on cars, so that trend was, in my view, the worst blight on automotive esthetics.

I don't dislike or like the styling of most current models of car, as they're pretty much all so banal. The current Cadillacs, on the other hand, for some bizarre reason remind me of electric razors.


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## B-17engineer (Aug 2, 2013)

_View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Ox1Tore9nw_


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## Shortround6 (Aug 2, 2013)

Hmm, tail fins or a car that looks like a used bar of soap???


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## Lucky13 (Aug 2, 2013)

Fins on the '59-'60 Cadillac are a wee bit.....on the big side, on the other hand, those on the '60 Chrysler aren't that small either!


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## GrauGeist (Aug 2, 2013)

The fins on the Chrysler Windsor rivalled that of the El Dorado, but Cadillac's still reign as the workd's largest


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## Lucky13 (Aug 2, 2013)

They sure do! question is though, which were the best looking fins?? 
Chrysler musy have had some of the largest taillights on those '57-'60 fins...

Than again, those on the early to mid-'60's Thunderbirds weren't small either!


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## Lucky13 (Apr 16, 2017)

From 2013....


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## Lucky13 (Apr 16, 2017)

Also from 2013....


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## Peter Gunn (May 12, 2017)

Grew up outside Detroit (Ann Arbor) in the '50's/60's and spent a lot of time going to the Motor City. It was truly beautiful back then, the "Paris of the Midwest", to see it now is painful, it will bring tears to my eyes if I'm not careful. Went back in 2014, managed to get down to the old Packard plant, was really stressing not having bullet proof glass, or just a plain out and out armored car. To see the once mighty "Arsenal of Democracy" reduced to this, my kids didn't believe me until we went through old history books and some family photos. 

As to why the auto industry settled there, I think the reasons were already stated, the copper and iron ore of northern Michigan and Minnesota certainly helped. Although, around 1915, Indianapolis was rivaling Detroit for car companies. Just a useless fact I guess.

Not to get political but let's just say, the party that has been in power there for decades has a lot of explaining to do for the state of the city.

Reactions: Agree Agree:
1 | Like List reactions


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## DerAdlerIstGelandet (May 12, 2017)

Peter Gunn said:


> *Not to get political* but let's just say, the party that has been in power there for decades has a lot of explaining to do for the state of the city.



Then why did you????


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## Peter Gunn (May 12, 2017)

Because even though I've been gone for over 30 years, I'm still passionate about the area I grew up in, so pardon me for pointing out the reason that destroyed something I hold dear.


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## DerAdlerIstGelandet (May 12, 2017)

Again this forum has a no politics rule. I'm tired of reminding you all of that.


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## Old Wizard (May 12, 2017)

The people at This Old House are helping to refurbish abandoned homes there.


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