Chevy Volt will bring 550 jobs to Detroit

Construction of the Chevrolet Volt electric car would bring 550 jobs to the city, General Motors Corp. officials told a Detroit City Council committee today.

General Motors is seeking a $136 million tax abatement over 25 years to build the car at the Detroit/Hamtramck Assembly Plant.

“It’s important because it introduces new technology for General Motors,” said Blake Watkins, tax abatement manager for Detroit’s Planning and Development division. “The electric car is very big to their existence.

“We will be evolving this technology here involving the residents of the city of Detroit…. and moving GM’s technology forward, at the same time moving the city of Detroit forward,” Watkins said GM has proposed $336 million investment into the plant to build the car. The plant currently employs 1,944, he said.

GM officials made their presentation to the city council Planning and Economic Development Committee. Only two members, Kwame Kenyatta and Barbara-Rose Collins, were at the meeting, and both seemed receptive to the abatement idea.

Council's fiscal analyst Irv Corley said the company would still generate an additional $4.6 million a year in tax revenue for the city and Detroit Public Schools even with the possible tax break.


The full city council must still approve the tax abatement and a vote could come as soon as next week.


GM has said the Volt expected to be ready by late 2010.

Hello! Chevrolet Cruze is global compact car names.

While General Motors' US-based global media centre has issued only a short statement announcing the name of the replacement for Chevrolet Europe's Daewoo-built Lacetti, a spokesman for GM UK's media relations department has revealed exclusive details of the car's global significance to AutomotiveWorld.com.
Some sources had, until now, suggested that 'Ultra' would be the new vehicle's name, following the debut of a Lacetti-sized hatchback concept with that badge at the Paris show two years ago. While the Cruze is likely to share certain styling cues with that design study, the Cruze at Paris will be a four-door sedan. A larger car than the Lacetti (Nubira in some European markets), it will run alongside the existing five-door hatchback, sedan and wagon series "for about 18 months", according to Chevrolet UK's product manager for Communications, Craig Cheetham.
GM says the Cruze was developed by a global design and engineering team and will be built "in multiple locations around the world". The Cruze "approaches an overall length of 4.6 metres and offers ample interior space and cargo capacity for five passengers".
Cheetham confirmed that the new model will be the first production application of GM's Delta 2 architecture and that the Cruze for Europe would be on sale from January. The UK importer at least, will offer GM and Motori Moderni's existing 1.6-litre gasoline and 2.0-litre turbodiesel I4 engines respectively but a 1.4-litre gasoline unit may follow for other regional markets.
The car itself is vital for GM as it will bring all its lower medium-sized vehicles onto one architecture and see the Cruze and its derivatives built in plants in Europe, Mexico, the US, Russia, South Korea and Brazil. While cars for Europe will initially be sourced from GM Daewoo, Cheetham would not rule out future exports westwards from GM Europe's forthcoming St Petersburg manufacturing complex.
For North America, this is undoubtedly the new model that Rick Wagoner recently hinted would be the replacement for the (Ohio-built) Chevy Cobalt. Expect production to start in 2009 for the 2010 model year.
The Cruze model name was used by GM for a Chevrolet-badged version of the Suzuki Ignis sold in Japan between 2001 and 2006, while a version of the same vehicle, the Holden Cruze, was sold in Australia between 2001 and 2005. These cars were far smaller than the forthcoming Chevrolet Cruze, which will share nothing with these models.