Chicago With An Automobile Manufacturer?

I'm vaguely batting around an idea of trying to boost Chicago over our timeline and one idea I had was for the city to have an automobile company based in it or right next to it in a neighbouring town, it being good for both income and blue collar jobs. So where do people think the best place to locate it would be? My initial thoughts were somewhere in the Far Southeast Side or possibly Far Southwest Side areas but I know there are some local Chicago and Illinois types lurking around the forum so thought I'd see what people suggested.

Chicago like many cities in the Midwest had several dozen motor companies when the industry was first starting out but most of them only lasted a certain amount of time being closing for business. The general idea so far is that when Thomas Jeffery sells his stake in the bicycle manufacturer Gormully & Jeffery in 1900 to concentrate on cars instead of buying the Sterling Bicycle Company factory up in Kenosha Wisconsin, which he renamed the Thomas B. Jeffery Company after himself, he buys a local Chicago firm. The Thomas B. Jeffery Company is important as sixteen years later former General Motors president Charles W. Nash bought it, it being renamed Nash Motors after its new owner, and then via a merger with Kelvinator formed Nash-Kelvinator before finally acquiring the Hudson Motor Car Company to create American Motors Corporation (AMC). Even throwing in some other companies like Diamond T, International Harvester, Packard-Studebaker, Yellow Cab, Checker Cab, a military side-business etc. means that it would still be a case of the Big Three and then AMC some way behind in fourth place though.
 
I'm vaguely batting around an idea of trying to boost Chicago over our timeline and one idea I had was for the city to have an automobile company based in it or right next to it in a neighbouring town, it being good for both income and blue collar jobs. So where do people think the best place to locate it would be? My initial thoughts were somewhere in the Far Southeast Side or possibly Far Southwest Side areas but I know there are some local Chicago and Illinois types lurking around the forum so thought I'd see what people suggested.

Ford does have a still-running assembly plant in Chicago IOTL, even though I know that's not what you're talking about. Would more plants from existing manufacturers headquartered elsewhere serve a similar purpose?
 
See the discussion here.
Thanks. Generally I don't really want to see Chicago dominate the industry since when conditions change that would kneecap it, witness Detroit. A smaller yet innovative company to help expand the city's economic base seems like the best option so far.


Ford does have a still-running assembly plant in Chicago IOTL, even though I know that's not what you're talking about. Would more plants from existing manufacturers headquartered elsewhere serve a similar purpose?
Yeah the Ford plant in Hegewisch in the Far Southeast Side, along with the Chrysler plant in Belvidere 65 miles northwest of Chicago and various Warner-Borg parts plants around Illinois. Really I was mostly interested in where potential plants might be built in Chicago since whilst the South Side looked like a good choice - cheap land, already existing industrial industries, decent transportation links etc. - it's often a piece of local knowledge that trips you up by showing why something is impractical. Since Ford has their parts plant in the South Side I'll probably just go with that.
 
Keep an existing one going

Perhaps you could kep one of the smaller motor car companies in existence. As the big ones consolidate their markets, someone finds and filles a niche market, be luxury cars, off road machines, or something.

One offbeat possibility: The company, whichever one you want, patents the hi-railer/road-rail vehicle, and management understands the railroad industry well enough to keep the market.
 
Perhaps you could kep one of the smaller motor car companies in existence. As the big ones consolidate their markets, someone finds and filles a niche market, be luxury cars, off road machines, or something.

Possibly, although such niche ones are more inherently fragile, and tend to go out of business or be absorbed by bigger ones (which in that case wouldn't necessarily affect the actual plants right away) during market downturns.
 
The idea was mostly that AMC would handle the smaller vehicle end of the market, Packard, having avoided the 120, the other full-size luxury end, with either Hudson or Studebaker, leaning towards Studebaker, somewhere between them. Since the replies here and via Private Message seem to have answered my main question about where to locate the plants in Chicago I'll probably start another thread for the actual company.
 
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