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Jefferson North Assembly Plant (JNAP) is a Stellantis North America
automobile A car or automobile is a motor vehicle with wheels. Most definitions of ''cars'' say that they run primarily on roads, seat one to eight people, have four wheels, and mainly transport people instead of goods. The year 1886 is regarded ...
assembly factory in
Detroit Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at t ...
,
Michigan Michigan () is a state in the Great Lakes region of the upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the 10th-largest state by population, the 11th-largest by area, and t ...
. Located on East Jefferson Avenue 6 mi (9.6 km) from downtown, near Grosse Pointe Park, the factory opened in 1991 as a major commitment to the downtown Detroit area by Chrysler, and was expanded in 1999, bringing its area to and expanded again in 2011, bringing its total to . Its first product was the Jeep Grand Cherokee from the start, which it continues to produce to this day. It uses the original site of the former multi-story Chrysler Kercheval Body Plant, a noted Detroit landmark for a series of large advertising signs on the roof, plus the
Hudson Motor Company The Hudson Motor Car Company made Hudson and other branded automobiles in Detroit, Michigan, U.S., from 1909 until 1954. In 1954, Hudson merged with Nash-Kelvinator to form American Motors Corporation (AMC). The Hudson name was continued through ...
location that was originally built during the 1940s as a storage lot for newly manufactured vehicles to the east of the facility. The Kercheval Plant was imploded, and video of the demolition was used in a Chrysler Corp. commercial with Lee Iacocca using the new plant as evidence of the company's investment in new product.


History

Jefferson North is the only auto assembly plant that is entirely within the Detroit city limits, and the only surviving auto assembly plant to be based within Detroit proper. A second plant, Detroit/Hamtramck Assembly owned by General Motors, where Cadillacs are manufactured, is partly in Detroit and partly in the neighboring city of Hamtramck.Last Car Plant Brings Detroit Hope and Cash
- ''New York Times'' - July 16, 2013
Chrysler announced in August 2008 a 1.8-billion-dollar investment in the plant that would expand it by and upgrade the facility for the production of a new product in 2010. Improvements in the plant occurred during a period of intense corporate turmoil for the parent company.
Daimler-Benz The Mercedes-Benz Group AG (previously named Daimler-Benz, DaimlerChrysler and Daimler) is a German multinational automotive corporation headquartered in Stuttgart, Baden-Württemberg, Germany. It is one of the world's leading car manufactu ...
had sold its majority stake to Cerberus Capital Management in 2007. Cerberus and the
United Auto Workers The International Union, United Automobile, Aerospace, and Agricultural Implement Workers of America, better known as the United Auto Workers (UAW), is an American Labor unions in the United States, labor union that represents workers in the Un ...
agreed in 2007 to a plan whereby entry workers are paid $16/hour compared to $28 for long-term UAW employees. The Cerberus-owned company went into bankruptcy in 2009 with the company getting a multibillion-dollar bailout by the United States government before ultimately being acquired by Fiat in 2011. In 2013, more than 300,000 cars a year were being produced at the plant and its work force was reported at 4,600 working, with the plant in operation 24 hours a day. The crews work an "alternative work schedule" (AWS) known as 3-2-120 that does not require Chrylser to pay overtime or weekend pay. The schedule was part of the bailout package. Each crew works 10 hours a day for 4 days ("A" 5 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Monday through Thursday; "B" 4 p.m. to 2:30 a.m. on Wednesday through Saturday; "C" 10 hours on the night shift Monday and Tuesday and 10 hours on the day shift Friday and Saturday). The 3/2/120 comes from a practice of working for three days, taking off two (plus Sunday for everyone) so that everyone works 120 hours over every three weeks. In August 2013, the Jefferson North Assembly Plant produced its 5,000,000th vehicle since it first made the 1993 Jeep Grand Cherokee ZJ in 1992. The vehicle was a 2014 Jeep Grand Cherokee WK2 Overland. A decal was placed on the windshield of the vehicle to signify that it was the 5,000,000th vehicle produced at the Jefferson North Assembly Plant. The vehicle was donated to the USO, whom Jeep and Chrysler Group support. A 1993 Jeep Grand Cherokee Laredo 4X4 is also on display at JNAP to celebrate this milestone. President
Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, Obama was the first Af ...
visited the plant in 2010 to speak to the workers at the plant. He said that the first new vehicle he ever owned was a 2000 Jeep Grand Cherokee Limited. On May 5, 2015, Fiat Chrysler announced that an employee had been killed at Jefferson North's wastewater treatment plant.


Products


Current models

* Jeep Grand Cherokee (1993–present) *
Dodge Durango The Dodge Durango is a mid-size sport utility vehicle (SUV) produced by Dodge in three generations starting with the 1998 model year. The first two generations were very similar in that both were based on the Dodge Dakota and Ram Pickup, both fe ...
(2011–present)


Discontinued models

* Jeep Commander (2006–2010)


Jefferson Avenue Assembly

Prior to the opening of Jefferson North Assembly in 1991, Chrysler operated the adjacent Jefferson Avenue Assembly plant from 1925 through 1990 at Jefferson Avenue and Clairpointe Avenue, between the streets of East Jefferson Avenue and Freud Street. The factory was originally built in 1907 to produce Chalmers automobiles, and later
Maxwell Maxwell may refer to: People * Maxwell (surname), including a list of people and fictional characters with the name ** James Clerk Maxwell, mathematician and physicist * Justice Maxwell (disambiguation) * Maxwell baronets, in the Baronetage of ...
automobiles. In 1925, the newly formed Chrysler Corporation took over the plant to build the Chrysler Six and later its flagship
Imperial Imperial is that which relates to an empire, emperor, or imperialism. Imperial or The Imperial may also refer to: Places United States * Imperial, California * Imperial, Missouri * Imperial, Nebraska * Imperial, Pennsylvania * Imperial, Texas ...
. In addition to Imperials, various other models from
Chrysler Stellantis North America (officially FCA US and formerly Chrysler ()) is one of the " Big Three" automobile manufacturers in the United States, headquartered in Auburn Hills, Michigan. It is the American subsidiary of the multinational automotiv ...
, DeSoto,
Dodge Dodge is an American brand of automobiles and a division of Stellantis, based in Auburn Hills, Michigan. Dodge vehicles have historically included performance cars, and for much of its existence Dodge was Chrysler's mid-priced brand above P ...
, and Plymouth would eventually be assembled here. The plant officially closed in February 1990 and was razed a year later. The Chrysler Kercheval Body Plant stood on the north side of East Jefferson, and was connected to Jefferson Assembly by a bridge crossing Jefferson in the 1950s. The Jefferson Avenue Assembly was approximately three miles east of the
Dodge Main Detroit/Hamtramck Assembly, also called Factory Zero, is a General Motors automobile assembly plant straddling the border between Detroit and Hamtramck, Michigan. It is located about three miles (five km) from GM's corporate headquarters. ...
factory in nearby Hamtramck, the
Packard Automotive Plant The Packard Automotive Plant is a former automobile-manufacturing factory in Detroit, Michigan, where luxury cars were made by the Packard Motor Car Company and later by the Studebaker-Packard Corporation. In 2022, it was scheduled for demolition ...
which was across the street from the Dodge Factory, and the Plymouth Lynch Road Assembly in Detroit.


See also

* List of Chrysler factories


References


External links

* {{Chrysler Group LLC assembly plants Chrysler factories Former motor vehicle assembly plants Economy of Detroit Motor vehicle assembly plants in Michigan 1991 establishments in Michigan