A Long and Angry Road for What Once Was the Fisher Body Plant #21

If you were to visit Detroit today, chances are you’d come face to face with a sad reality. A once vibrant and thriving area, Detroit now houses more relicts of the automotive industry than it does working plants. Blame the economy, automotive manufacturers, workers or all of the above, but the vintage automotive plants that once shook with life now lay eerily dormant in a balance between historic remembrance and Detroit’s less than pleasant side.

Although rough, abandoned and shed of almost every ounce of metal, the old Detroit Fisher Body Plant #21 still remains intact. Perched on the corner of Piquette Avenue and St. Antoine Street in the old automotive district, Fisher #21, once a thriving body manufacturing plant for Fisher and GM, now rests in shambles, covered with graffiti, dirt and the evolutionary moss, the only living thing that still survives there today. A sad sight for sure, there is a lot to be learned and grieved about a place like this.

Recently, SubStreet.org ran an amazing article on the old Fisher Body Plant in Detroit, complimenting it with pictures from back in the building’s good ole days and photos of what has become of it today. A truly amazing read, we were captivated by the history and prestige that SubStreet was able to capture at the old building.

Abandon in 1993, the plant now looks more like a war-struck warehouse than a once top-of-the-line carriage and automotive body manufacturing facility.

It was here that the saying “Body By Fisher” came to life nearly a century ago, although one would not know of this distinct honor by looking at the place now.

In all reality, automotive manufacturers grow and acquire new manufacturing equipment, more workers and the need for more space. Unfortunately more times than not, this leaves buildings like the Fisher Body Plant abandoned and left to slowly die away in their own time. We understand progression, but isn’t there a better way?

Be sure to read the article from SubStreet.org and tell us what you think should happen to old automotive manufacturing plants such as Fisher #21.