The Ford Motor Company has formally unveiled design plans for Michigan Central, a neighborhood-anchoring 30-acre redevelopment in Detroit that will give way to an “inclusive, vibrant, and walkable mobility innovation district” centered around the restored Michigan Central Station. Ford acquired the iconic and once in-ruins 1914 Beaux Arts landmark—closed and left to languish in the late 1980s—in June 2018 with plans to transform it into the mixed-use centerpiece of the new district. Developed by the project’s lead architect and planner, the New York-headquartered Practice for Architecture and Urbanism (PAU), the site plan was first made public at a November 17 virtual community meeting.
Also publicly revealed last week were the Gensler-headed plans for the Book Depository, a revitalized Albert Kahn-designed structure completed in 1926. Located just to the east of Central…