Normally, the Reason To Go Home and Drink is a stomach-churning news bite that will piss you off when you read it. Not this time…for once, we have good news to share. When the Dodge Viper ended production, the Connor Avenue assembly plant that had been the home of the Viper since 1995 went into mothball mode. With no more Vipers to produce, and no new models coming down the pike to take the famed snake’s place, what was to become of the former Champion Spark Plug facility? Would it end up in the same sad situation that American Motors’ old Southfield, Michigan headquarters would find itself? We’d hoped that it wouldn’t, and it turns out that we won’t have to worry about that.
Connor Avenue is going to be turned into the museum that will house the cars that were left temporarily homeless after the closure of the Walter P. Chrysler Museum. With the former museum’s space now Maserati’s headquarters, Connor Avenue’s 400,000 square feet of floor space is the perfect place to move to. It won’t be open to the public immediately…right now FCA is just planning to corral the cars together and get them under a roof first. But there is a plan to open the upcoming museum to the public and hopefully later down the line will use it’s spot near 8 Mile Road in Detroit to host some of the events that take place nearby, including Woodward Dream Cruise activity.
