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Detroit's Packard plant starting to look like 1930 again

First Stage Of Restoration Includes Custom Wrap For Pedestrian Bridge

The revitalization of Detroit has a long way to go, but it took another big symbolic step last week thanks to the efforts of Fernando Palazuelo. The Peruvian real estate developer bought the derelict Packard Plant roughly 18 months ago and his company, Arte Express, is paying to renovate it for business uses. He's begun with the pedestrian bridge over East Grand Boulevard that connected two plant buildings, draping it with a printed cover that makes the bridge look as it did in 1930.

Right now that bridge is actually tired concrete supports holding up a span of graffiti-splattered brick and a bunch of smashed-out windows. Palazuelo says restoration of the entire 40-acre site "could take decades and total $300 million," but he has vowed that the bridge restoration will be completed next year. According to a report in the Detroit Free Press, the first few tenants shouldn't be that far behind.

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