CSX to Get New CEO on September 26

CSX CEO James Foote will retire later this month and be replaced by a former Ford Motor Company executive.

Taking the helm of CSX on Sept. 26 will be Joseph R. Hinrichs, 55, who has worked in the automotive, manufacturing, and energy industries for more than 30 years.

Joseph Hinrichs

At Ford he was president of the company’s automotive business until 2020. He also served as President of Global Operations, President of the Americas, and President of Asia Pacific and Africa.

In a statement, Hinrichs pledged to continue CSX’s focus on growth, technology, and improving the company’s culture.

Hinrichs also serves in advisory and board positions of various companies including Exide Technologies, Luminar Technologies, microDrive, and First Move Capital.

He previously served as a Senior Advisor at Boyden California, an operating advisor at Assembly Ventures, as well as a Director at Ascend Wellness Holdings; GPR, Inc.; Rivian Automotive, Inc.; and Ford Motor Credit Company.

He was chairman of the National Minority Supplier Development Council from 2016-19 and also served on the boards of CEO Climate Dialogue, Climate Leadership Council, and the US-China Business Council.

Hinrichs earned a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering, graduating magna cum laude from the University of Dayton, and an MBA from the Harvard Business School.

He was awarded an Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from Tiffin University and an Honorary Doctor of Science and Business Administration degree from Cleary University.

A CSX news release said Foote will serve as an advisor to Hinrichs for six months. The CSX statement said the appointment of Hinrichs was a “planned secession.”

Foote also will step down from his post on the CSX board of directors

A story posted on the website of Railway Age included a note from editor William C. Vantuono saying that during a short interview following the announcement, Hinrichs said having experience as a major railroad customer will be beneficial in his new job at CSX, and that addressing the service delivery challenges of the past two to three years will be his prime focus.

Vantuono noted that Hinrich’s experience as a railroad shipper is similar to the background of former Canadian National CEO J.J. Ruest, who had a long tenure in the chemical industry, another major user of railroads for transportation

Detroit Depot Restoration Moving Along

Restoration of the former Michigan Central station in Detroit is well along and project managers expect it to be complete by the second quarter of 2023.

Once completed, you’ll be able to eat, drink, work and even get married in the longtime Detroit icon and symbol of urban decay, but you won’t be able to catch a train.

The depot’s days as a train station ended in early January 1988 when Amtrak ceased using it and the beaux arts building’s new owner has other plans for the area where passengers once boarded trains.

The 18-story MC station has been owned by the Ford Motor Company since 2018. For decades before Ford bought it, the structure, which opened in 1913, had seemed destined to be razed.

Nearly all of its windows had been broken and anything of value had been stolen or removed.

During a news media tour last week of the station complex, project managers said the building was missing everything imaginable when workers began their renovation five-year work.

Ford plans to locate restaurants and a luxury hotel on the upper three floor of the station.

Offices for Ford and its partners in the mobility and autonomous vehicle endeavors will be housed in the next 10 floors.

The bottom floors will be devoted to public gathering spaces, a coffee shop, a food court, and events space with a capacity of 1,000.

The former boarding area will become a mobility testing site to be named The Platform.

During the media tour, Ford’s project manager, Rich Bardelli, said the project remains within its $740 million budget. Ford bought the building and its adjacent properties for $90 million.

Much of the early restoration work at the station involved restoring infrastructure that had vanished during the years when the structure sat vacant and was a target of vandals, thieves and squatters.

This included installing 300 miles of electric wire; 20 miles of heating and cooling duct work and piping; 6 miles of plumbing pipes; and 8.6 miles of grout in between 29,000 terracotta tiles along the arching ceiling of the front waiting room.

Some of the station’s original architectural features had to be recreated and painstakingly installed.

More than 1,700 of the Guastavino terracotta ceiling tiles had to be replaced, which involved building 252 tons of scaffolding to place them 65 feet above the floor.

Engineers used 3-D printing and resin to recreate 560 new lightweight ornate floral rosettes and leafs that adorn the windows.

Most of the original iron rosettes had been removed and during the restoration process some individuals who had possession of some of them dropped them off at the construction site so they could be reinstalled.

Located in Detroit’s Corktown neighborhood, the station is the centerpiece of a campus Ford is creating that will cost $950 million.

Ford plans to move 2,500 of its employees in autonomous and electric vehicle development departments to the campus. There will be space for 2,500 more Ford workers from suppliers and partners in the mobility sector.

Aside from the station itself, Ford is renovating the adjacent Book Depository building for use as offices and plans to construct a third office building on the campus.

Bardelli said dining options in the station complex will be located on the top floors of the tower; the former carriage house on the west end of the building along Vernor Highway; and a food court in the concourse.

Negotiations are underway with potential retail, hospitality and hotel vendors and contracts are expected to be reached later this year.

Over the next 18 months craftsmen will be recreating some of the other historic features of the station, including wood wainscoting panels, crown molding, marble borders and wood floors in the former waiting rooms.

“We’re in the midst right now of just starting to put all of that back,” Bardelli said.

The former waiting areas are being repurposed into events space and Bardelli said Ford has already received inquiries from couples who want to get married there.

CSX to Serve New Ford Electric Vehicle Plants in Kentucky, Tennessee

CSX will serve facilities that Ford Motor Company plans to build in Kentucky and Tennessee to build electric vehicles and the batteries to power them.

The centerpiece of Ford’s plans is a 3,600-acre campus called Blue Oval City located northeast of Memphis that will assemble F-series battery-electric trucks and make batteries for electric vehicles.

The site is located along the CSX Nashville-Memphis main line. In Kentucky, Ford plans to build a facility in Glendale to produce batters for electric Ford and Lincoln vehicles.

That $5.8 billion plant is located on the CSX Louisville-Nashville line on 1,500 acres of property that CSX designed as a megasite in 2010.

In a news release, Ford officials project the two sites will begin production in 2025 and employ 11,000.

Ford said it expects that half of its vehicle production by 2030 will involve electric vehicles.

Back in the Weeds

You can find some amazing things tucked away in railroad dead lines or seldom-used sidings.

That was where these GE 132-ton locomotives were found.

The units are Wellsville Addison & Galeton Nos. 1800 and 1500 and they are in the dead line in Galeton, Pennsylvania, on July 26, 1973.

Both units were once owned by the Ford Motor Company.

Photograph by Robert Farkas

Ford Paid $90M for Michigan Central Station

The price of saving a historic Detroit train station and transforming it into a facility to develop new technologies in the automotive industry was $90 million.

The Automotive News reports that was how much Ford Motor Company paid to buy the decrepit Michigan Central Depot, which will be the centerpiece of a 1.2 million square foot development that also includes residential, commercial and event space.

The figure was taken from government records and means that Ford paid $150 per foot for the 104-year-old, 600,000-square-foot building.

Ford plans to develop electric and autonomous vehicles at the campus it plans to establish at Michigan Central Station.

The company is seeking more than $230 million in tax credits for the project.

Ford Seeks $230M to Help Develop Detroit Depot

Ford Motor Company is seeking more than $230 million in aid to help it develop the former Michigan Central station in Detroit.

Of that, the automaker is asking the City of Detroit to kick in $100 million. The funds will be used to build a technology campus around the depot, which has been vacant and in deteriorating condition for many years.

Ford agreed last June to purchase the station and said it will spend more than $700 million of its own money to develop it.

The Detroit Economic Growth Corporation provided details of Ford’s bid for public assistance in a presentation this week.

During the presentation, officials projected the station development efforts will result in a net benefit to the city of $370 over 35 years.

Ford Details Plans for Detroit Station

Ford Motor Company said Tuesday that it plans to make the former Michigan Central station in Detroit the focal point of the company’s new mobility hub.

Built in 1913 in the city’s Corktown neighborhood, the station will be renovated to provide offices for its autonomous and electric vehicle teams and partners.

The grand hall will be restored to its original appearance and have local shops and restaurants.

The overall mobility hub project will see construction of 1.2 million square feet of space where by 2022 about 2,500 Ford employees will work.

Ford said it will devote 300,000 square feet of space to a mix of community and retail space and residential housing.

In a statement, Ford described development of the Michigan Central Station as critical to its future as it examines how urban areas are changing the overall role of transportation and the revitalization of cities.

An open house will be held in Michigan Central station June 22-23 that will feature exhibits of historic artifacts, self-guided tours through the station’s first floor, and a preview of an upcoming History Channel documentary showcasing Detroit’s comeback and the station’s critical role in the city’s revitalization efforts.

Amtrak ceased using the station in 1988 in favor of an adjacent modular facility. It later opened a station in the New Center neighborhood.

The 13-story office tower of Michigan Central Station stands 230 feet in height. Passenger service at the station began on Jan. 4, 1914.

In recent years, the station had become a symbol of urban decay with all of its windows broken out, and the building being used by the homeless, for criminal activity and by paintball enthusiasts.

Hundreds of antiques have been stolen from the station site over the years.

Ford Buys Detroit Michigan Central Station

Ford Motor Company has purchased the former Michigan Central Station in Detroit and plans to make it the centerpiece of an advanced automotive technology development in the Corktown neighborhood.

The station had been owned by the Moroun family since 1995 and had managed to survive a 2009 order of the Detroit City Council to raze the dilapidated structure.

Ford also acquired an adjacent building known as the Roosevelt Warehouse, which had previously been used as a schoolbook depository.

The 18-story Central Station has long symbolized urban blight in Detroit with its vacant offices and broken windows. It is surrounded by razor wire and a chain link fence.

Amtrak used the station from its 1971 inception until moving to a nearby modular facility in January 1988. Amtrak later built a station in the New Center neighborhood of Detroit that it began using in May 1994.

Matthew Moroun declined to disclose the sale price of the depot. “The deal is complete,” he said. “The future of the depot is assured. The next steward of the building is the right one for its future. The depot will become a shiny symbol of Detroit’s progress and its success.”

Ford plans to share information about its plans for renovating the station at a reception on June 19.

Reports that Ford was negotiating to purchase the station have circulated since March.

Based in suburban Dearborn, Ford has transferred 200 workers on its mobility team into a nearby former factory site and is actively seeking other properties in Corktown, Detroit’s oldest surviving neighborhood and located just west of downtown.

Opened in 1913, the Beaux Arts-style Michigan Central Station was at the time the world’s tallest train station.

Although the Morouns failed to demolish the station, they did install more than 1,000 new windows, restored a working elevator and cleaned up the interior.

“The Ford move to the train station is the right play at the right time,” said Robert Kolt, a professor of advertising and public relations at Michigan State University, in an interview with the Detroit Free Press. “Many university grads want to work and live in cool places with an energetic vibe. Ford can remake the area and rebrand what the company does with this type of bold move.”

“I think it’s smart,” Robert Davidman, partner at the Fearless Agency in New York told the Free Press. “If you really want to attract the top talent, you go to where they are. And this allows Ford to take a piece of history and reinvent it. This makes them forward thinkers. Ford is breathing life into something that once was — Ford is going back to their roots, back to where it all began. And it brings back the luster.”

Ford’s plans for the complex it is developing in Corktown include making it the focal point of the company’s efforts to shift toward self-driving, shared and battery-operated cars and logistics.

Corktown is located seven miles down Michigan Avenue from Ford’s world headquarters in Dearborn.

Ford Action Not Expected to Affect Railroads

A decision by Ford Motor Company to end production of most sedans in North America is not expected to have a major affect on Class 1 railroads Trains magazine reported.

Ford plans to stop making  the Fusion, Fiesta, Taurus, and C-Max at assembly plants in the United States and Mexico, but will make other vehicles at those factories.

The automaker based in Dearborn, Michigan, said the models being ended sold  315,400 vehicles last year of the 2.03 million vehicles it sold in North America.

Ford plans to focus more on its more profitable sport-utility vehicles and pickup trucks, most notably those in the F series.

Trains said the Taurus is built at the Chicago Assembly Plant served by Norfolk Southern. Ford will begin building the 2020 Lincoln Aviator SUV at the plant.

The C-Max is built at the Michigan Assembly Plant in Wayne, jointly served by NS and CSX Transportation. Ford also produces the Focus at the Michigan plant.

The Fusion, which is the best-selling model being discontinued, is built at an assembly and stamping plant in Hermosillo, Mexico, which is served by Kansas City Southern.

KCS also serves the Cuautitlan Stamping and Assembly Plant in Mexico, which churns out the Fiesta.

After phasing out these models, Ford will build just two cars, the Mustang and the Focus, which will debut as a new crossover dubbed the Focus Active.

Ford Might Buy Detroit Train Station

Ford Motor Company may purchase the long vacant and dilapidated Michigan Central Station in Detroit.

The station, which was once used by New York Central and later Penn Central and Amtrak passenger trains, is owned by billionaire trucking mogul Manuel “Matty” Moroun and his son, Matthew.

Ford has neither confirmed nor denied a news report by Crain’s Detroit Business that Ford is talking with the Morouns about buying the depot.

Crain’s said an announcement about the sale could come as early as sometime in April.

The report indicated that Ford would use the former station site for offices that could be used by upwards of 1,000 employees.

The business newspaper said a source familiar with Ford’s pursuit of the station said Ford wants to establish a workplace in an urban setting that can attract younger workers.

“Our young people love . . . living and working in urban areas,” said Ford Executive Chairman Bill Ford Jr. in January at the Detroit auto show.

The news has triggered widespread interest in the purchase of properties surrounding the station site in Detroit’s Corktown neighborhood southwest of downtown.

Real estate broker James Tumey said he has received several cash offers, even at the full $540,000 price, for the properties that look out on the 500,000-square-foot depot.

“After this news, people are going crazy. They are buying just based off of Ford maybe coming in, throwing out offers on properties they haven’t even seen,” said Tumey, a Corktown resident who is vice president for Farmington Hills-based Friedman Integrated Real Estate Solutions.

The abandoned railroad station has been an eyesore in Detroit since the last Amtrak train pulled out in 1988 in favor of a new and smaller station in the New Center neighborhood.

Crain’s cited unnamed sources in saying that Ford is also interested in acquiring the former Detroit Public Schools book depository immediately to the east.

The auto company based in Dearborn has reportedly also looked at other properties not owned by the Morouns in the area for purchase.

Developers say that redevelopment of Michigan Central Station and its office building would cost at least $400 million.

Ford has already announced plans to establish offices for its autonomous/electric vehicle division along Michigan Avenue in Corktown.

Matthew Moroun told Crain’s last year that he has broached the idea of Amtrak returning to Michigan Central Station with Kirk Steudle, director of the Michigan Department of Transportation.

Steudle has said he’s receptive to the idea and connecting the old train station to the central business district in the same way the QLine streetcar system connects the New Center area with downtown.

The Maroun family has reportedly spent more than $8 million over the past five years rehabilitating the building, including installing a freight elevator in the shaft of the depot’s original smokestack and installing 1,100 windows.