Detroit Metro Airport Zip Code

I recently went to Metro Airport and I noticed that the receipts from the restaurant and stores I went to had the address as Detroit. After getting home, I looked it up, and sure enough Metro Airport's address says Detroit [[and so does the Marriot, & other businesses at the airport) and the zip code, 48242, is listed as Detroit.

I was just curious about the history of this, but couldn't find anything via google. So I figured I'd ask about it here. Is this just a postal service thing, or is Metro Airport considered to be in the city of Detroit? Like, do they pay city taxes? Also, anyone know the history behind the designation as Detroit?

Don't know for sure, but I'd guess this is purely a Postal Service thing. I believe the USPS can set up zip codes and post office names pretty much as they see fit for their administrative convenience. My sister and her husband live in an established suburb several miles outside Pittsburgh, but mail to them is addressed to their street address, Pittsburgh PA, and a Pittsburgh zip. Kind of like if mail to Royal Oak were to be addressed to Detroit MI 482xx.

I'm absolutely positive Metro is within the city limits of Romulus, and airport workers don't pay Detroit income tax. I've never seen a map of the Detroit limits that shows them expanding to include the airport. This kind of thing does happen sometimes, however. At some point in the last 60 or so years, the city limits of Chicago expanded to include O Hare airport. Find a map of the Chicago area that shows municipal boundaries, and you'll see there's a corridor of Chicago shooting out the Kennedy Expressway, then expanding to encircle O Hare.

There is a Detroit PO at the airport that you can go to 24 hours if you have something you want sent out ASAP.

The airport used to be part of Inkster's ZIP code, 48141, until the postal facility was built there in the late 1960s.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by gazhekwe

There is a Detroit PO at the airport that you can go to 24 hours if you have something you want sent out ASAP.

---

That might come in handy. Do you have to go through security to get to it? Do they postmark on the spot?

No.

Yes.


The Redford Twp. PO on Beech Daly s/o Five Mile used to be open 24 hours also. Don't know if they still are.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by gazhekwe

There is a Detroit PO at the airport that you can go to 24 hours if you have something you want sent out ASAP.

---

No, sorry,not anymore. It's been closed for about two years. When they were up & running with those hours it was about 8 yrs ago. About 5 yrs ago, they went to being closed midnight to 6 am. About a year after that, it was regular post office hours. Then they closed altogether. I think all the new terminal construction did them in as they were close to the international terminal.

Thanks for the replies.