Willow Run Assembly was a General Motors

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 regarde ...

factory near

Ypsilanti, Michigan Ypsilanti (), commonly shortened to Ypsi, is a city in Washtenaw County in the U.S. state of Michigan. As of the 2020 census, the city's population was 20,648. The city is bounded to the north by Superior Township and on the west, south, an ...

, located at 2625 Tyler Road, in the

Willow Run Willow Run, also known as Air Force Plant 31, was a manufacturing complex in Michigan, United States, located between Ypsilanti Township and Belleville, built by the Ford Motor Company to manufacture aircraft, especially the B-24 Liberator hea ...

manufacturing complex. Willow Run Assembly consisted of an assembly plant of 2.3 million square feet, another building that was known in later years as "Willow Run Company Vehicle Operations", covering 23,000 square feet on 22 acres of land, and perhaps other parcels. Willow Run Assembly was to the south of the former Willow Run Transmission, the site of the bomber plant built by

Ford Ford commonly refers to: * Ford Motor Company, an automobile manufacturer founded by Henry Ford * Ford (crossing), a shallow crossing on a river Ford may also refer to: Ford Motor Company * Henry Ford, founder of the Ford Motor Company * Ford F ...

in 1941. Production of automobiles began at Willow Run in 1959 with the

Chevrolet Corvair The Chevrolet Corvair is a compact car manufactured by Chevrolet for model years 1960–1969 in two generations. A response to the Volkswagen Beetle, it remains the only American-designed, mass-produced passenger car with a rear-mounted, air- ...

; Willow Run also built the

Chevrolet Nova A nova (plural novae or novas) is a transient astronomical event that causes the sudden appearance of a bright, apparently "new" star (hence the name "nova", which is Latin for "new") that slowly fades over weeks or months. Causes of the dramat ...

(1962-1979), the X-bodies (1980-1985), the GM H body, and the

Chevrolet Caprice The Chevrolet Caprice is a full-sized automobile produced by Chevrolet in North America for the 1965 to 1996 model years. Full-size Chevrolet sales peaked in 1965 with over a million sold. It was the most popular car in the U.S. in the 1960s ...

. Corvairs were assembled at Willow Run during the car's entire 10-year production run. On May 14, 1969, the media was invited to Willow Run as the last Corvair came down the line; a departure from GM's policy of not permitting reporters to visit their manufacturing facilities. In 1968, General Motors began reorganizing its body and assembly operations into the GM Assembly Division (GMAD). GMAD required 16 years to completely absorb Fisher Body's operations, and Fisher would manufacture bodies at Willow Run until the 1970s. Assembly operations at Willow Run ended in July 1993 after a reduction in demand for the full-size B-bodies of the time. Operations were transferred to the Arlington Assembly Plant in Texas. What was the main plant at Willow Run Assembly had by 2010 become a giant warehouse, the "Willow Run Business Center", part of which was leased to GM for use as a parts distribution facility. Willow Run Company Vehicle Operations became part of the abandoned GM properties managed by the RACER Trust in March 2011; in April 2013, RACER sold the Company Vehicle Operations facility to International Turbine Industries, an engine maintenance and repair company headquartered across Tyler Road from the former assembly plant.

References

{{General Motors factories General Motors factories Former motor vehicle assembly plants Motor vehicle assembly plants in Michigan Ypsilanti, Michigan 1959 establishments in Michigan 1993 disestablishments in Michigan