American Icon Spared From Chopping Block

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Automotive giant General Motors filed for Chapter 11 protection Monday according to MSNBC News. The move is a part of the Obama Administration’s notion to downsize the behemoth corporation to a more sustainable size, and makes the federal government the largest shareholder in the company. So far GM has received about $20 billion in government aid and is slated to get about $30 billion more from tax payers in the US. The company said in a press release on Monday that it will be closing 14 plants in the US, and placing other facilities on “standby status” in the coming months.

Bowling Green, Kentucky’s Corvette Assembly Plant was spared from the chopping block according the Bowling Green Daily News. In an April 29, 2009 article Rex Roy of AOL motors speculated that the Corvette could facing extinction. Roy cited pressure from Democratic lawmakers and the Obama Administration for US automakers to build more so called Green Cars, and the fact that GM had closed its High Performance Vehicle division. However in a Conference call yesterday with media GM Vice President Tim Lee said that the Corvette plant will stay in business, and that the iconic American muscle car will continue to be a core GM product. He called the Corvette a “very, very obedient car” and said the plant should continue to compose between 35,000 and 50,000 cars per year according to the Associated Press.

Eldon Renaud – President of UAW Local 2164 – expressed relief upon hearing the news The BG Daily News reports. “You’re always concerned that if you have plants that are operating at lower volume that they could be combined,” he said. The plant has been lazy for several weeks this. A two shutdown began Monday with another scheduled for the first two weeks in July of this year. Lee says that because the Corvette is such a specialty car it cost more per man hour to invent, and that justifies the limited shifts and long shutdowns. The facility has only been running one production shift when it is operational, in comparison with most other US plants which three shifts per day.

The plant which is located just off Interstate 65 in Bowling Green used to produce both the Corvette and the Cadillac XLR, which the company has ceased building. Lee said that he doesn’t foresee another vehicle taking the place of the XLR anytime soon. Renaud said the plant only employee roughly 500 people today versus the nearly 1,800 at its 1986 peak.

Sources: 1. MSNBC 2. press release 3. Bowling Green Daily News 4. Bowling Green Daily News. 5. Rex Roy of AOL Motors. 6. Associated Press