As the largest city in Michigan, Detroit is a place where Ford and Dodge made history, and it is also a "prosperous place" for many automobile companies to get rich. The vigorous development of the automobile industry in the United States and even the world cannot be separated from the boost of Detroit. In the last century, Detroit ushered in its own "golden age".
However, the wheels of the years are rolling forward, and there is no eternal winner under the changes of the times.
In 20 13, Detroit, once a car city with infinite scenery, officially declared bankruptcy and became the largest bankrupt municipal government in American history. For a time, remarks such as "Detroit collapse" and "great changes in the automobile industry" emerged one after another. It seems that the era of Detroit and even traditional cars is officially over.
However, at the end of 20 14, the Detroit municipal government officially declared bankruptcy and the municipal finance was transferred from the federal government to the Detroit municipal government again. At the end of 20 19, Detroit was a strong finalist in the "20 19 Top 500 Global Cities List".
What the hell happened in Detroit? What step did you take?
The Golden Age of Detroit
Originated in Detroit, France, and prospered in America.
At first, when a Frenchman was sailing along the Detroit River, he found an ideal place to live. 170 1 year, a French officer set up a fur trading center here, and also provided protection for French warships traveling to and from the Great Lakes. In the dark, Detroit was inseparable from cars at the beginning of its construction.
The French officer's name is Anthony Mens Cadillac. Sounds familiar, doesn't it? Because GM's Cadillac brand is to commemorate this French officer.
The wave of industrialization swept through. After Detroit was incorporated into the United States, a large number of gold-plated buildings were built in Detroit at the end of 18, which was called "Paris of the United States".
Because of its strategic position in the Great Lakes waterway, Detroit has gradually become a transportation hub. With the rise of shipping, shipbuilding and manufacturing, Detroit has developed steadily since the 1960s. 1879, Detroit welcomed a boy of 16 years old, who left his hometown and wanted to get ahead. His name is Henry Ford.
Yes, that's Ford's Ford
That year, he came from a farm in Michigan to Detroit, the largest city in Michigan. As a "bottom drift", he first entered Westinghouse Electric Company as a mechanical apprentice, barely maintaining food and clothing. 1882, 19 years old, returned to his hometown farm and got married.
1893, Ford was promoted to be the chief engineer of Edith company, but in his spare time, he often used the newly produced internal combustion engine in Europe for experiments. It was not until 1896 that Henry Ford built his first car in his rented factory on Mike Street.
The legend of Detroit began.
1908, Ford Model T rolled off the assembly line. The production of this car continued until 1927, and the global sales reached as high as150,000. With the joint efforts of Ford, William C. Durant, john francis Dodge, Horace Elgin Dodge and walter chrysler, Detroit has gradually become the capital of the world automobile industry.
As a result, Detroit firmly controlled the American auto market. Looking around the world, if a city has a world-class automobile enterprise, it is already valuable. In Detroit, the three automobile giants Ford, General Motors and Chrysler all made their fortune here.
In the 1950s and early 1960s, Detroit was one of the most prosperous and wealthy cities in the United States and the fourth largest city in the United States, with a population of nearly 2 million. People are proud of living in a motor city. The development of industry attracted a large number of residents from the southern United States, which made the population of Detroit increase sharply in the first half of the 20th century. In the heyday of the development of the automobile industry, Detroit's fiscal revenue on automobiles even accounted for nearly 80% of the total fiscal revenue.
Until now, we can still see the general motors headquarters in Detroit Renaissance Center, which is the most beautiful place in Detroit. The headquarters consists of five buildings. These beautiful buildings stand on the Erie River, facing the northern Canadian city of Windsor across the river, making the GM headquarters a landmark building on the Detroit map.
Cars are the pride of Detroit. However, no model can always prosper. At the moment when the automobile industry is constantly changing, Detroit has also fallen into one crisis after another.
[Ye Cheng Auto, a defeated car]
In the 1960s, Detroit was still advanced, prosperous and rich, which was the envy of the whole world. Since 1980s, Detroit has been frustrated by crisis after crisis.
Today, the "rust belt" around the Great Lakes has become a sinking place in the old industrial era, and Detroit, as a once dazzling pearl, has also been eclipsed. People began to believe that one dollar could buy a house in Detroit. Detroit, the darling of the automobile industry, has already fallen from the altar.
Detroit-Ye Cheng Automobile Company, a loss-making car.
Since the 1970s, with the "oil crisis" and other major events that changed the direction of the automobile industry, the automobile industry in Japan, South Korea and Europe, which is more fuel-efficient and economical, has flourished. Ford, GM and other gas-guzzling American automobile industries are declining, and Detroit, the automobile city, is also gradually declining.
Detroit once had a single industry and relied too much on the automobile industry, and 80% of its fiscal revenue came from automobiles. On top of the prosperity, auto dealers began to adjust their business, and the risk of Detroit's over-reliance on a single industry was gradually exposed.
At the same time of the decline of American cars, as the automobile industry began to decentralize, factories gradually moved to suburbs and neighboring States. Job opportunities are no longer as concentrated as they used to be. The disappearance of jobs is multifaceted. In addition to economic reasons, there are technological developments.
For example, after signing an agreement with the trade union, an important thing that the automobile industry thinks of is to go to the automobile production line. Because the most powerful workers in labor negotiations are the workers who perform the most dangerous jobs, and factories spend the most money on these workers.
As a result, the automobile factory first replaced these risky positions with automated robots, then further automated other links, and finally achieved efficiency improvement, which naturally led to large-scale layoffs. This trend was further strengthened in the information technology revolution in the1980s.
During this period, the number of unemployed people in Detroit's manufacturing industry exceeded 6.5438+0.3 million. Unemployment is rising, corruption is serious, fiscal revenue is declining, and cities are heading for the abyss.
Abandoned skyscrapers, factories and houses can be seen everywhere, social security has deteriorated sharply, and cases of theft, car theft, robbery and shooting have occurred frequently. In urban areas, basic public services and safety such as medical rescue, police patrol and fire fighting are not guaranteed, and even street lamps cannot be turned on, so people have fled this "ghost town".
Detroit in the trough is like Gotham, except there is no Batman to save it.
The global financial crisis in 2008 hit Detroit's automobile industry hard. The American auto market is divided up by foreign companies, leaving Detroit with less and less share, forcing American auto companies to lay off employees. The massive population loss led to the collapse of the city's real estate industry. By June 30th, 20 18, Detroit's total long-term liabilities exceeded1400 million USD.
Detroit's problems are not just the city, but the epitome of many cities in the post-industrial era of the United States.
In the first half of the 20th century, the population growth of traditional industrial cities in the eastern and central parts of the United States began to slow down, and the population decreased after World War II. Even in new york, this period has declined. These cities are called "rust belt".
The reason why it is called "rust belt" naturally means that these cities have entered the post-industrial period, and traditional industries have begun to decline, just like machines have rusted.
In New England, the textile industry was the first fully industrialized industry that year, but it was also the first industry to encounter the bottleneck of automation. At the beginning of the twentieth century, it began to move to the south where labor was cheaper. For example, the steel industry in Pittsburgh faced the problems of aging and low efficiency of production equipment after the war, and its competitiveness lost to new overseas rivals after the war.
In this way, the plight of pillar industries and the reverse flow of population have caused the development of cities to fall into recession, and the population of "rust belt" cities has begun to shrink. From 1950 to 2007, the population of Detroit decreased by 55%.
A large number of people moved out to the suburbs, which not only brought about a sharp drop in urban tax revenue, but also caused a large number of abandoned houses in the city. According to the survey in 20 10, there are 33,000 abandoned houses and 90,000 open spaces in Detroit, accounting for13 of all residential buildings.
It is estimated that there are 40,000 to 50,000 abandoned buildings in downtown Detroit. These abandoned houses and abandoned streets have brought great challenges to the maintenance of daily facilities in the city. There is even news on the Internet that "1 USD buys a Detroit house".
The terrible thing is that the news is true.
However, the decline of the automobile industry will only make Detroit depressed for a while, and will not completely destroy the city. Today, with the continuous development of intelligent network, Detroit has its own "transformation route".
[Bet on whether auto-driving Detroit will take off for the second time. ]
When it comes to autonomous driving, we usually think of Silicon Valley at the first time. The gathering of technology companies such as Waymo and Tesla that develop autonomous driving is the best stage for autonomous driving technology.
But compared with Detroit, Silicon Valley can only be said to be "young".
Ford and GM, both time-honored brands with a price of more than 65,438+000, have spent more than a century researching, producing, testing and selling automobiles, and have a very high position in the whole industrial chain.
Although the autonomous driving technology of these two Detroit auto companies is not well known, they have great potential to make breakthroughs in this field with their intensive cultivation in the automotive industry for many years. In addition, Detroit Auto Company has also taken some strategic measures to make up for its weaknesses.
Ford invested $654.38+0 billion in artificial intelligence equipment alone. It acquired the crowdsourcing company Chariot and invested in the company that produces lidar. In the eyes of many people, lidar is indispensable for the development of unmanned vehicles. In 20 19, Argo, a startup invested by Ford, said that Ford is planning to extend the road test of its third-generation self-driving hybrid vehicle to Detroit.
Another GM is also catching up. First, it cooperated with Raffles to ensure that its self-driving vehicles can be tested on the road as soon as possible. Then, it acquired Cruise, a research and development testing company for autonomous driving technology. Today, Cruise has become one of the best unicorns in the field of autonomous driving.
According to the latest report of Navigant Research, two of Detroit's "Big Three" are Ford and General Motors, ahead of Silicon Valley and German automobile and technology competitors.
At present, Detroit's crazy pursuit of autonomous driving technology makes people wonder, when did Detroit wake up?
In 20 18, the Michigan legislature passed the most forward-looking state law in the United States, supported the testing of self-driving cars, and strived to be at the forefront of the new automobile industry.
Michigan received the support of US senators, who proposed the AV START Act to promote the development of autonomous driving technology at the federal level.
The Detroit Chamber of Commerce is very supportive of the bill because it will provide a clear regulatory framework for the safe development of self-driving cars. The bill puts forward an important task, that is, "ensuring automobile safety is a priority in the short term" and instructs the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to formulate the required comprehensive safety regulations.
It is this national highway traffic safety administration that quarrels with Tesla all day. Behind the two is the "fairy fight" between Detroit and Silicon Valley.
In order to help autonomous driving land faster, the bill also established a technical advisory Committee. The committee will bring together policy experts from industry, government and security circles to provide information for these new safety regulations.
At the same time, the University of Michigan, the world's top transportation institution, is constantly sending talents. The city is fully capable of leading the development of self-driving cars independently. For a time, the University of Michigan and Stanford University in Silicon Valley were neck and neck in the field of autonomous driving.
A few years ago, when the autonomous driving technology first showed its edge, many people thought that the traditional automobile industry represented by Detroit was too bloated and slow, and it was likely that they would hardly become the leader in this competition. However, automakers who felt the chill behind them responded quickly. They have invested a lot of manpower, material resources and financial resources in research and development, and also put down their posture to form an alliance with technology companies.
Today, Detroit has not only built a dedicated testing ground, but also has an unparalleled density of engineers in other cities in the United States. Talents, funds, policies and enterprises are all in place. Detroit has no reason to lose in this battle of autonomous driving.
[written at the end. ]
When we learn about a distant city, news is the most convenient way, but it also has great limitations.
Take Detroit as an example. When the whole network regards it as a "wasteland", the buds nourished by science and technology have quietly sprouted. Detroit is still prosperous and is one of the most competitive cities in the world.
But these changes are so far away that we won't know. Because the novelty of news will focus on striking places to play, everyone believes that Detroit always seems to have a house with 1 dollar.
Don't think Detroit is finished. He's fine.