Mercedes-Benz imported special wood for the floors of its Vance, Alabama, assembly plant in the mid-1990s, for example, while Ford's Rouge flagship plant in Dearborn, Michigan, features an eco-friendly living roof covered in plants.
Each factory (with perhaps the exception of number 10) is worth at least a virtual visit, so we've included a Google Maps link. We encourage you to explore each plant from your computer. If you get the chance, they're worth a real-life visit.
The 10 most fascinating car factories
1. Fiat's Lingotto plant, Turin, Italy. MAP Now a premium hotel, what was once Fiat's flagship factory was immortalized in the original "Italian Job" movie (the one without Marky Mark). It was revolutionary in its day for a variety of reasons, but its biggest technical innovation was that, rather than a large single-floor footprint, it stretched five stories into the sky. Raw materials started at the bottom, emerging on the top floor as vehicles. But before they could be produced, Fiat tested each car on a rooftop-mounted race track, which still (somewhat) stands today.
2. Palacio Chrysler, Buenos Aires, Argentina. MAP Modeled after Fiat's Lingotto facility, this Chrysler plant in Argentina featured a steeply-banked oval race track on its roof. It was penned by Italian-born architect Mario Palanti, whose ornate buildings dot historically important cities of Argentina and Uruguay today. The Chrysler plant was actually opened by the company's regional distributor and it lasted until well after World War II. About 20 years ago, it was converted into luxury apartments as the area that surrounded it became one of Buenos Aires' most desirable real state districts.ÂÂ
3. Volkswagen's Transparent Factory, Dresden, Germany. MAP The VW Phaeton was unlike any other "people's car" before it, and the powers that be at the German automaker decided it needed to be built in a special factory. Thus was born the world's most intricate "glass" factory, a gigantic facility that allows natural light to enter through almost every wall. Moreover, the plant has no smokestacks and it uses Dresden's existing public transit network to transport car parts on specially-made cargo trams that ride on the same rails as commuters.
4. Ford's Highland Park Assembly Plant, Highland Park, Michigan. MAP Although Highland Park was hardly Ford's first assembly plant, it is arguably the automaker's most famous. Henry Ford commissioned noted Detroit industrial architect Albert Kahn to design the building in the Highland Park enclave, and it was at this plant that Ford debuted its revolutionary assembly line concept. Today, much of the plant has been converted into a strip center, although the original building remains under Ford's control, where it is believed to house some historical records.
5. Kaiser/Ford/GM factory in Willow Run, Michigan. MAP Opened on farmland owned by Henry Ford, Willow Run was designed initially to build B-24s during WWII. After the war, Kaiser acquired the plant, then GM leased and later bought it. GM built a few cars there, including the Chevrolet Corvair, but it was more notable because the General used it to build Hydramatic transmissions... and M16 rifles during Vietnam. Today, the plant is idle, but its heritage lives on in the nearby Ypsilanti Automotive Heritage Museum thanks to the efforts of its curator, Jack Miller (he's also the man behind the excellent Orphan Car Show in Ypsilanti).
6. Rolls-Royce assembly plant, Springfield, Massachusetts. MAP Recognizing that most of its post-World War I buyers were in North America, Rolls-Royce opened up shop in Springfield, Massachusetts, where it began building chassis for various American coachbuilders in 1921. The venture lasted until 1931, when luxury car sales dwindled as a result of the depression. The factory itself was actually demolished earlier this year when its current occupant, braided steel hose manufacturer Titeflex, decided that a more modern facility was in order. Ironically, Titeflex supplies hoses to Rolls-Royce Group, the aerospace arm that is no longer related to the automaker.
7. Packard Plant, Detroit, Michigan. MAP Perhaps no building in the world has seen so high a rise and so great a fall as the still-majestic Packard plant in Detroit. Located just inches from GM's Hamtramck plant, the Packard facility's grand Albert Kahn-penned design befitted the elegant cars that rolled out of its doors until its closure in 1958. Since then, it has deteriorated at a rate that exceeds just about anything else in Detroit - a real feat on its own. Parts of the building were subleased to various tenants, but it has been wholly unoccupied for more than a year, which means that it continues to attract graffiti. The city of Detroit wants to tear it down, but we don't see it tumbling any time soon.
8. Ford's Twin Cities Assembly Plant, St. Paul, Minnesota. MAP Sadly, this plant's storied history just came to an end. Twin Cities was Ford's oldest still-operational plant, having been inaugurated in 1924 to produce Model Ts. At that time, it was common for automakers to have many assembly plants since shipping cars across the country - or the globe - was a challenge. The Twin Cities plant sat on a sand bed that was mined to build glass, while it used hydroelectric power from the adjacent Mississippi River, which almost made it eco-friendly... aside from all the industrial dumping that was de rigueur for the era, of course.
9. VW's Westmoreland Assembly Plant, New Stanton, Pennsylvania. MAP Talk about a mess. Pennsylvania basically gave away an unfinished Chrysler plant to VW in the mid-1970s, but VW didn't quite seem to know what to do with things. They made their popular Rabbit cheaper in a bid to be more competitive, but the decontenting process extended to the way the cars were assembled. The plant was beset with labor issues from day one, and a notoriously elusive VW management didn't care much either. In what may be the least considerate manufacturing move in recent history, VW told its workers on Thanksgiving weekend that it was shuttering the plant the next summer. ÂÂ
10. Iran Khodro Plant, Tehran, Iran. MAP More notable for its location and the vehicles it produces than for any innovations in its facility, the Iran Khodro plant might be the world's most mysterious car production site. Khodro is the country's largest car producer, but since capitalism isn't the official language of Iran, the company is run under Mahmoud Ahmadinejad sort of like Henry Ford's dream plant. The firm grooms its workers for lifetime employment as it builds cars under various joint-ventures with partners as diverse as Fiat, Toyota and Mercedes-Benz. Like Ford in the early days of the automotive era, Khodro builds nearly every component itself with few outside suppliers not owned by the company involved.
