DETROIT (Michigan News Source) – Crews have started demolishing the remains of an industrial complex on Detroit’s east side, whose future space may be occupied by a self-storage facility. 

Employees of the Adamo Demolition Co. have started tearing down parts of the historic Continental Motors Co. plant located at 1610 Algonquin St. earlier this week.  According to the Detroit Free Press, the owner of the property is a limited liability company linked to MCSS Self-Storage of Miami, FL, which develops self-storage sites in urban settings. 

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The facility opened its doors 110 years ago to build car engines primarily, but shifted production to help in the World War II effort by constructing tanks and aircraft engines.  In order to test engines before they were put into use, Continental built testing cells in 1942 which allowed engineers to run them at full power with blast-proof glass and thick concrete walls surrounding the engines during testing. 

When the roar of the engines subsided and Continental Motors became Continental Aluminum in 1979, the metal smelting and recycling company lasted nearly two decades before moving facilities- leaving the warehouse, foundry, test cells and water tower.  Since then, the warehouse, foundry, and water tower have either been partially or fully removed leaving the test cells and some other elements of the warehouse. 

Detroit issued a demolition permit from last month to Adamo, reported by the Detroit Free Press, grants permission to demo the test cell structures but does not mention the powerhouse building.   

The previous owner of the plant site, Detroit developer Philip Kafka, bought it for more than $200,000 in 2018.  While he admitted to intentions of building developments around the plant as he did with Detroit’s Core City neighborhood, he eventually decided to sell it in October of 2021 for more than four times the buying price. 

“I make money as a developer, not as an investor,” he said. “I didn’t buy the property to flip it. So I just wanted to get my money out of it, and get back to Core City.”

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Currently, Detroit is engaged in numerous blight demolition projects throughout the city.  Several other commercial projects headed by Adamo are the 8100 Schoolcraft building, 5260 W. Chicago apartment building, and the 6199 Concord portion of the Packard Plant parcel all with the estimated completion date of December 2022.   

The Packard Plant, which had portions of its demolition begin in late September, opened almost a decade ahead of Continental Motor Co. and shared the same architect, Albert Kahn.