I've climbed up to this spot a few times. Somebody laid down tiles and put up a couple ladders so you can climb to the top. Last time I was up there, somebody had constructed a pretty decent home out of what looked like a church steeple.
Has anyone else seen this, or know what it was?
http://maps.google.com/maps?q=rosa+p...,199.22,,0,3.5
Yeah, I know it well, socks. It's a cement ramp that used to take the railroad tracks up to an overhead trestle that ran down to the old railroad station on Third Street. Jefferson avenue, from that point to third, looked like a street in Chicago with the El on the overhead. The trestle was all steel, painted black, and was pretty ugly. It came down about 1970 or so, leaving the ramp to nowhere.
Scroll down at this link about halfway for some still image captures from the movie Detroit 9000, much of which was filmed around Fort Street Union Depot and the approach viaduct prior to demolition in the mid 1970s.
http://atdetroit.net/forum/messages/6790/54651.html
The depot was last used in 1971 on the eve of Amtrak. The viaduct stretched from 12th Street to east of 8th Street/Cabacier Drive. The gab between W. Jefferson and the rear of the Post Office, where trees are planted, was the alignment for the viaduct. There are many photos of it in various Detroit railroad history books, but I've not had much luck online.
Here is one such image from the C&O Historical Society of an evening Pere Marquette entering the viaduct near 8th Street.
http://cohs.org/repository/Archives/...cspr-cl282.jpg
Looks like I dropped some firewood in the foreground, opps!