Quo Vadis Marquees Removed. Full Demolition Next?

[Lowell]

Someone above mentioned that Service Merchandise has been vacant for a decade -- longer than the QV if so. Is Westland demolishing it too? As anyone can see its sign is a broken "eyesore" and its parking lot has weeds sprouting through its many and increasing cracks.

[Gistok]

They closed a profitable entity to redirect business to another entity? Right. No one in their right mind would do that. They would capitalize on the fact that they would control a large share of the entertainment in the area, and use that to their advantage. The Quo Vadis was obviously NOT PROFITABLE hence why it was ultimately closed.
<snippage>

-Tahleel

Actually Tahleel, you must not be familiar with theatre operations. This exact scenario has happened all over the country. The most famous example was in Chicago where the 3600 seat Chicago Paradise Theatre [[on Chicago's west side) forced the nearby 3980 seat Marbro Theatre out of business. They did this with superior bookings.

Then they took over the larger Marbro, and moved their better product to that theatre, eventually closing the Paradise. This scenario played out all over the country. The plight of the Paradise was so famous because it was considered by many as the finest neighborhood movie palace ever, and was eventually pounded to rubble.

On a different note... someone mentioned that suburban theatres is what drove downtown palaces out of business. That's not entirely true.

In 1948 Congress forced the theatre/film studio monopolies to divest themselves of each other. From the 1920s until 1948 movie studios owned many of their theatres [[or in the case of Loew's, the theatre chain owned the MGM Studios). Once the chains were divested of their theatres, their product could be sold to any theatre, thus ending the "first run premiers" of the downtown palaces. The final nail in the coffin was Television in the 1950s.

With local neighborhood and suburban theatres now showing the same product at the same time as the downtown palaces, there was no incentive to drive all that extra way downtown. Plus the 1940s and 1950s were the era when many of the opulent movie palaces covered up the ornate plasterwork with curtains [[or worse, a remodeling)... "so you won't have to look at all that old stuff anymore". The opulence was considered old fashioned and outdated, thus negating the lure of the extra drive downtown.

Cinerama, exploitation films or conversion to dinner theatres or night clubs kept many of the downtown palaces on life supports, but not for long.

[reddog289]

I have been reading this thread and think that while it is good that the group trying to save the Que Vadis from the wrecking ball is doing this, I can't see what would become of it once it is saved.
I myself don't go to the show as much as I did even 2 years ago.And the last time I was at the Showcase Cinema down the street from the Que that place was empty while the newer Emagine has pretty much been busy since the get go.
There is allready one $1 show in that area [State Wayne] and I couldn't tell you the draw with that.But that theatre is used for other puposes besides movies.So that in itself would be a competitive force.
As much as I hate to say it I belive the Que Vadis which I would not call an eyesore quite yet, Will meet the same fate as the Schafer/Wayne Theatre.I wish something could be done with the place But in these times I don't see it happening.

[reddog289]

Now that I am really thinking, The number of theatres in that area has really shrunk to pretty much four that I can think of.
Emagine Canton
Canton Cinema
State Wayne
Penn / Plymouth
Which makes me think of the ones that are gone
Terrace, Mai Kai, Wonderland and Livonia Mall Cinemas, in Livonia
La Parisien in Garden City
Ford/Tel Dearborn Hgts
Dearborn/Showcase Dearborn
Plus the two that many posters might not have known about or even been born when they showed movies.
Calvin in Dearborn
Schafer in Wayne
And as for the Fairlane Theatres, Well they moved them since I was a teen.
But with the fact that the Que Vadis was designed by a famous man might keep it from going by the wayside. I can also say that the very tool we are using now is a factor in why these theatres have closed.Hell if you can bootleg a movie off the net burn a cd/dvd and watch it at home That saves you at least 5 bucks. But it all ties in with the bigger picture. You don't need to leave your house to be entertained. You can have an adult beverage and smoke whatever you want in your house while watching a movie on a screen that was unthinkable 10 years ago. The movie house in general is going the way of the corner store/bar and indepentant auto parts stores. Things that were landmarks in a community are now gone, empty or something else.
When there are this many people out there just trying to keep aroof over there head and food in their bellies the last thing they want to contribute to or see their money go to is a forelorn closed up movie house.
That is what I think.

[reddog289]

Last thing on this tonight, Hell put the Jackass eating the burger back on the roof of Brays. He ain't hurtin nothin.

[Meddle]

Funny how the mind goes away. I lived in Wayne for a while as well as Redford and Plymouth so I've been by all these places hundreds of times, but for the life of me I can't place many of them now. I'm studying Google Earth and trying to pick some of them out. The imagery is dated June 2007 and it looks like there are cars in the parking lot of what is ID'd as Sam's Club at Ford & Lotz, but somebody a few posts up says it closed in '04.

QV was at Wayne & Warren across from Westland Mall, right?

[Meddle]

Starting to get my bearings again. What's the building built at an angle at the N/W corner of Ford & Wildwood?

[Lowell]

Excellent analysis Gistok. I note that you didn't even touch on the free parking the new suburban venues offered. Arguably this was another governmental-driven factor such as new development incentives, government-financed highway and expressway projects that would have advantaged the mall-style theaters. Combine that with the de facto destruction of the street railway and other mass transit systems and the downtown / in town theaters did not have a chance.

As to what reddog was saying, I am not sure that cribbing movies from the web is that much of a threat as the quality is poor [for now] and the small screen and sound do not compare with the big screen. In other words I think that is more of a threat to television than the movie houses. Movie house attendance is not hurt by the current downturn although concessions are taking a hit. But given advances in home theater big screens and data projectors combined with direct streaming [I have done that via Netflix already] that threat is looming.

What is hurting the sixties-style suburban movie houses most, I would guess, is the stadium seating the new theaters offer. No big hair-do or 6'8" guy is going to ruin your view. Many of the former have sloping floors, but do not have the same comfort of view.

To survive it seems many of the sixties-style suburban movie houses seemed to think that they needed to chop their venues up into smaller screens as did the QV. The acoustic and visual factors considered in the original designs were lost and you feel like you are sitting in a tunnel with the screen askew. The now-named Dipson West River Centre, in a strip mall roughly at Grand River and Inkster, is a classic example. Even with new seats and a spruce up, the big screen experience is ruined.

[ggores]

Mai Kai

Nice list red, but man... I've seen a lot of local drive-ins and movie theatres called out here over the last couple years... but the Mai Kai... wow. Can almost see the marquee now. Nice job.

Many stories of many movies seen around here at drive-ins and theatres. I saw "Neighbors" at Livonia Mall. It starred Dan Akroyd and John Belushi. A very strange flick. And it may even be out of print.

[Sstashmoo]

Good point about screen size. The IMAX in Dearborn seems to fairing well. Basing it on, lots of people every time I go. I do remember being disappointed going to a walk-in [[what they used to be called, as opposed to a "drive-in") theater and seeing a small screen and due to the distance from the screen and it's relative size was not much better than Television.

Can I get a shout out for the Mel theater... I remember going there when I was about seven years old to see "Two on a Guillotine" , I thought it was the most beautiful building in the world.

[ggores]

Good point about screen size. The IMAX in Dearborn seems to fairing well. Basing it on, lots of people every time I go.

A bit overwhelming, the Imax... there was one at Cedar Point long long times ago. Imax rocks.

Quo Vadis, small screen, small room, like walking into someone's basement, seen Smokey and the Bandit, starring Jerry Reed, way, way, back, and also seen that awesome spooky flick made up by them MSU students entitled "Evil Dead". And to add to the irony of life, I saw "Born Free" at the Irving up on Fenkell, even posted a pic of it here just before them people smashed it down.

Location, location, location.....

[Lorax]

Funny how some posters seem to delight in dropping turds in the punchbowl around here, you know who you are.

I will apologize to Ziggytoast for having to put up with the defeatist attitudes and lack of forward thinking regarding the QV, and if anyone read my earlier post on the subject, there are several ideas of adaptive reuse of this building which are not only feasable, but preferable over erasing such a landmark theatre.

My earlier thought, if indeed there was a deal from a fitness center to open up there, then reuse the building. It couldn't be simpler-

Auditorium and back-of house areas used for swimming pool, saunas, steamrooms, mechanical, etc.

Lobby used as it is now, as a lobby, sign-in area, juice bar, coffee shop/restaurant, and keep the fireplace lit in winter.

Reconfigure the parking lots to include an outdoor pool/workout areas with landscaping, and of course improved parking. Outdoor good-weather work out spaces are the new thing here in Florida, and is catching on up north now too.

Next idea- Has anyone thought of looking to secure funding for transforming the building into a museum to the career work of Yamasaki? Could the firm, which is still in business, be recrutied to assist? Give Westland a destination other than lousy strip malls, and it would actually be a good reason for outsiders to go there.

The auditorium could be used to show films on architecture, art, be leased out to visiting theatre groups, etc. An architectural bookstore could be a part of it, as well as a restaurant. Provide great lease terms to any outside restaurant operator to run it.

It will take a combination of different funding to pull it off, but with the real estate market the way it is, there is every opportunity to get this property at a steal, as opposed to a few years ago. The previous thought of 5 million is bogus- I would be shocked if it appraised for anymore than a million bucks.

Zigggytoast, I congratulate you for your efforts- you remind me of what I was doing at your age, and in the end, it will be people like you who end up doing the most for preservation of our built environment.

[48202]

How many screens did the Quo Vadis have when it was constructed?
How many screns did it have when it closed?
Any speculation why the marquees were removed at this time?

[reddog289]

I hope I ain't dropping turds in the fishbowl. But after the Tiger Stadium deal I don't get too excited or gung ho about the future of anything historic or otherwise.
I would like to see the building reused, Yet I look at the title of the thread and it pretty much sums it up.

[Sstashmoo]

Quote: "I will apologize to Ziggytoast for having to put up with the defeatist attitudes and lack of forward thinking regarding the QV, "

Ziggy, You do need to be careful who you take ideas from. Most people are clueless about business. As exampled in Lorax's post.

Quote: "Has anyone thought of looking to secure funding for transforming the building into a museum to the career work of Yamasaki?"

Haha..

I just took a drive by there. By the general look of things, big box stores, small retail, etc. The Quo VAdis sticks out like a sore thumb. Just a big dark tacky hulk of a structure that looks as though it was dropped from some time warp into 2009 suburbia and landed on a empty parking lot on Wayne Road.

Lorax, It's for lease, go for it.

[Lorax]

Quote: The Quo Vadis sticks out like a sore thumb. Just a big dark tacky hulk of a structure that looks as though it was dropped from some time warp into 2009 suburbia and landed on a empty parking lot on Wayne Road.

Substitute "Quo Vadis" for "SStashmoo" and you've got it just about right.

A land mass with a perm.

Oh, and as for "knowing about business"

If you only knew! LOL!!!!

[Ziggytoast]

It is true I am no business expert, I am merely a high school student. I thank you for your criticism, like I said before, I learn from it. Many of your concerns I can now be more aware of. Thank you.

48202: Originally the Quo Vadis opened with 1,200 seats in 3 theaters and was surrounded by the Algiers, a 1,486-car drive-in. When it closed in 2002, there were I believe 6 theaters with a final seating capacity of 1,798. The marquees came down because the Northern marquee had bottomed out. Luckily we were able to save some of the letters that weren't completely mangled.

[catch22]

It is true I am no business expert, I am merely a high school student. I thank you for your criticism, like I said before, I learn from it. Many of your concerns I can now be more aware of. Thank you.

48202: Originally the Quo Vadis opened with 1,200 seats in 3 theaters and was surrounded by the Algiers, a 1,486-car drive-in. When it closed in 2002, there were I believe 6 theaters with a final seating capacity of 1,798. The marquees came down because the Northern marquee had bottomed out. Luckily we were able to save some of the letters that weren't completely mangled.

Actually, the theatre opened with just the main auditorium. The 2 "Penthouse" theaters upstairs didn't show up until a year or two later. The original idea was for the second floor to be a nightclub of some sort [[for which the "ramp to nowhere" in the lobby would have been the main entrance). After that plan fell through, the second floor was reconfigured for the two theaters and the second marquee installed.

[iheartthed]

I have heard rumbling from people in the know that the next big real estate shoe to drop is the commercial market and the it threatens to be as big as the residential collapse.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1251..._whats_news_us

[jj84]

Westland's rapid business closings is because of Canton, the Population and money expansion to the west, and just tenants who left the Detroit market or went bankrupt. A lot of those closed business have now relocated to Canton to be closer to 275. Over the past few years Westland has had the closings of retailers Office Depot, Staples, Service Merchandise, TJ Maxx, Loan Star, GFS, Sam’s Club, Showcase, Michaels, Carino’s. GFS, Circuit City, Cost Plus, Value City. [[I’m sure I am missing some) There just isn't that many Big box retailers that need 30K-100K of retail space anymore.

It is the same thing that is happing all over metro Detroit, you have the inner ring suburbs becoming very similar to what Detroit is [[abandoned homes and stores) the mid-ring suburbs that are starting to look like what the inner-ring suburbs did 15 years ago, and the out-ring burbs that are still having building going on. Westland will move to Canton [[What is going to happen to Westland Mall if they build the proposed Mall at 275 & Ford Rd?) to the south you have Taylor moving to Woodhaven/Brownstown, and farther up 275 you have Farmington moving out toward Novi/Milford.

What I can’t figure out is that they fixed up a 1/2mile stretch of Ford rd with no business on it. Rather than investing that money around the shopping area, the city needs to clean that area up, put nice lighting fixtures down Wayne and Warren, put the power and utility lines underground. Put in Landscaping along the Roads to make it look more like Ford Rd in Canton. They should fix that up as well along Ford Rd make Westland look inviting from Canton. Part of that is hard as the railroad bridge on Ford Rd is a barrier, too bad when they built that 30 years ago they went over the tracks and not under. Westland could make it better though by putting lower and more decretive street lighting on the bridge to make it look nice.

But rather spending DDA funds on things like this -- they spend them building a splash park...

[Danny]

Westland's rapid business closings is because of Canton, the Population and money expansion to the west, and just tenants who left the Detroit market or went bankrupt. A lot of those closed business have now relocated to Canton to be closer to 275. Over the past few years Westland has had the closings of retailers Office Depot, Staples, Service Merchandise, TJ Maxx, Loan Star, GFS, Sam’s Club, Showcase, Michaels, Carino’s. GFS, Circuit City, Cost Plus, Value City. [[I’m sure I am missing some) There just isn't that many Big box retailers that need 30K-100K of retail space anymore.

It is the same thing that is happing all over metro Detroit, you have the inner ring suburbs becoming very similar to what Detroit is [[abandoned homes and stores) the mid-ring suburbs that are starting to look like what the inner-ring suburbs did 15 years ago, and the out-ring burbs that are still having building going on. Westland will move to Canton [[What is going to happen to Westland Mall if they build the proposed Mall at 275 & Ford Rd?) to the south you have Taylor moving to Woodhaven/Brownstown, and farther up 275 you have Farmington moving out toward Novi/Milford.

What I can’t figure out is that they fixed up a 1/2mile stretch of Ford rd with no business on it. Rather than investing that money around the shopping area, the city needs to clean that area up, put nice lighting fixtures down Wayne and Warren, put the power and utility lines underground. Put in Landscaping along the Roads to make it look more like Ford Rd in Canton. They should fix that up as well along Ford Rd make Westland look inviting from Canton. Part of that is hard as the railroad bridge on Ford Rd is a barrier, too bad when they built that 30 years ago they went over the tracks and not under. Westland could make it better though by putting lower and more decretive street lighting on the bridge to make it look nice.

But rather spending DDA funds on things like this -- they spend them building a splash park...

Some of your statemants above are non sequitur! The recession is main culprit is big box crash. There is plenty of congested traffic around the Westland Mall area in order to build big box retial stores. You will still see more big box stores over ex-urbs like Canton TWP. Wixom and Novi etc. Some open and some close as long it has congrested traffic and booming ecomony and consumer confidence.

[jj84]

Some of your statemants above are non sequitur! The recession is main culprit is big box crash. There is plenty of congested traffic around the Westland Mall area in order to build big box retial stores. You will still see more big box stores over ex-urbs like Canton TWP. Wixom and Novi etc. Some open and some close as long it has congrested traffic and booming ecomony and consumer confidence.

Recession has to do with some of the closing or pulling stores from Michigan -- it doesn't have to do with the moving of GFS, TJMaxx, Sam's, Movie Theater [[license), Office Depot, Michael’s, Pier 1. If Westland was such a great place to do business, business would be there. They see better opportunities in Canton. Westland has failing demographics, higher taxes than Canton, no freeway access, and no destination retailer like Ikea, and to a lesser extent Sam’s Club [[which would be about the same trade area Westland Mall has), it looks very dirty along that area, in both the vacancies and ascetics, as well the community has no common feel to it. GFS moved about a mile away from its old location on Ford Rd to be closer to the heart of the shopping district. When there have been big box vacancies in Canton they have been snatched up and redeveloped over the past 5 years, the same thing cannot be said for Westland.

[Danny]

jj84

You have quoted that the reason Westland's big box stores are decling because of Canton. I say that your statement is non-sequitur. Recession is the cause of most big box retailer stores surrounding Westland Mall to decline. It's not just the property taxes or the city codes. Corporations can deal with the higher taxes. The result will be grabbing congested traffic patrons to their stores before they head on someplace else. It's all about the 'Dead Presidents' in marked green gold paper for profits. The man from the Centers of Urban Studies from University of San Antonio contended that congested trafficking would lead patrons to rest their cars to big box stores in order to shop and move on.


WORD FROM THE STREET PROPHET

In Memoriam: Neda Soltani

[RickBeall]

The Quo Vadis illustrates that Architecture goes through phases in public taste. The public taste tends to be time based.

New & exciting
Dated [[30 or more years old)
Tacky [[often these only survive if the area in question is too poor to pull the building down)
Exciting and worthy of being saved [[probably 80 to 100 years old)

The Tacky category also requires that the building have some sort of moderate use so that it gets at least some maintenance. Without any maintenance, a building only lasts about 30 years [[I decided after watching the series "Life After People"..

The Quo Vadis just needed to sit for another 40 years or so before it was worthwhile.

[Danny]

The Quo Vadis is pretty to be torn down. Make it into a independent movie complex.