Lordstown’s exciting prospects

Lordstown’s exciting prospects

Last week’s media tour of the General Motors Lordstown complex provided a fascinating insight into what’s planned there, and a hopeful glimpse of new possibilities.

The accent, naturally enough, has been on the launch of the new Chevrolet Cruze, not only because it was a completely new product for the Lordstown plant, but because it is a vehicle that has come to represent the future of General Motors. It will be the first new car launched by the new General Motors in the United States. It is designed to appeal to a quality conscious buyer by its styling, its technology, its higher quality interior fabrics and its fuel-efficient power train.

It was also designed with world markets in mind, and plants in South Korea, China and Russia will produce the car as well.

That Lordstown won the U.S. rights to build the car is a tribute not only to the present workforce, but to a commitment made years ago by managers and union officials at Lordstown at a time when the future of the plant was dim.

More than a Cruze

Now, it seems that Lordstown assembly workers and manager have another opportunity to write a brighter history for the plant and, by extension, for the Mahoning Valley.

Last week’s plant tour made it clear that the Cruze could be just the beginning of Lordstown’s future. Reconfiguration of the assembly line at the plant will allow for the eventual production of as many as seven models that are based on the Cruze platform. This promises to be a much more sophisticated use of manufacturing capabilities than the 1980s, when the plant simultaneously produced Chevrolet Cavaliers, Buick Skyhawks, Oldsmobile Firenzas, Pontiac Sunbirds and, even, Cadillac Cimarrons through little more than cosmetic alterations.

The American auto industry has been through tough times, so tough that they have changed the face of General Motors, once a symbol of American industrial innovation, might and profitability.

Lordstown is one of those plants that has the potential of not only surviving the corporation’s reorganization, but of being a vital part of the new GM for years to come.