[jcp123]

Neato! I have driven past this plant a few times while trucking. It actually doesn't look like much from the road, but a satellite photo looks far more impressive.

By the tail lights and bumpers on the Civics, it's '96 or '97. I think the CL might have gone on sale in '97, so it might be that somewhere in the factory, my Civic was being built during filming! It was a 9/96 car, #3056 for the '97 model year.

It was cool to see the automated parts vehicles back then; it was equally striking to see the cars still being painted by an actual human. In a sense, though, I kind of liked seeing that there were humans actually feeling the stamped fenders and the how the panels met.

I sat and waited in a GM plant for some meeting to finish so they could check in a load of tires I was dropping. Union rules meant I had to wait for a certain person to get back to sign off on the delivery, which was frustrating, but in the meantime I got to watch the Equinoxes as well as the Traverse/Enclave/Acadia triplets roll by. It really is that quiet and orderly in an auto plant. The Americans also seem to have taken to heart the little tones you hear, which seemed to have meant a stoppage due to quality or something, the line stopped for about 5 minutes accompanied by really similar chiming sounds. It was fascinating. And the folks were some of the nicest I met at a delivery, a far cry from the gruff, grizzled Michigan auto workers I expected to find.