U.S. Steel idling Zug Island plant, laying off up to 1,545

[Lowell]

The end of Zug Island? This icon of Detroit industrial might has been blasting since 1902. It was also the site of my first job in Detroit.

"U.S. Steel plans to indefinitely idle "a significant portion" of its Great Lakes Works production facility in Ecorse and River Rouge and will issue WARN notices to 1,545 workers at the steelworks the company said Thursday.

"The operations at the Zug Island plant will begin to go dark in April 2020. No employees will be affected before then, according to a statement from U.S. Steel.

https://www.crainsdetroit.com/manufacturing/us-steel-idle-operations-zug-island-plant-lay-1545

[angry_fred]

As sad as it is for those people to lose their jobs, it's about time for that island to be cleaned up.

[Wheels]

No more hum?

[rickbak]

But that can't possibly be! Just Wed. nite in Battle Creek, Prez Lardazz said steel is back!

"Look what I’ve done for steel. I mean, the steel is back. We taxed all the dumb steel coming in from China and other places, and US steel mills are doing great — they’re expanding all over the country, and they were gonna be out of business within two years the way they were going."

[Dan Wesson]

zug island produces iron.

[renf]

This is the first time I heard that iron ore is mined on Zug Island.

[Dan Wesson]

Sho nuff! For the longest time I thought it was the place to mine the salt under the river.

[Lowell]

When I worked there, Zug Island smelted iron ore and produced coke. I believe that has been its purpose all along.

[Dumpling]

I work adjacent to Zug Island and can vouch for the Detroit River levels
being as high as they've been in the last twenty years. The River Rouge
level looks similiar to flood stage for a thirty or hundred year rain.
There certainly are other factors in this business decision but Zug
Island is a place where iron ore pellets and coal are piled high
on the docks and a collapse of some part of the island under
the weight of a pile would be a crisis.

[Dumpling]

Other DetroitYes posters mentioned the website MarineTraffic and
it shows lakers docked at Zug as well as the places the lakers travel
to and from.

[Wheels]

zug island produces iron.

You can’t make steel without iron.

[Johnnny5]

You can’t make steel without iron.

In a way you can, and that's the problem. The recycling of steel has taken such a huge part of the market that there's less demand for producing steel from virgin iron. Improved technology has made making new steel from recycled products easier and cheaper. Add that to a decade of China dumping steel into the market and there's plenty of it to go around the first time, then again, again and again.

[Richard]

In more recent years, the steelworks on Zug Island have been a sore spot for neighbors in Detroit and Windsor, who have complained of air and noise pollution.

You would think people would be ecstatic over its closing,no more air or noise pollution to deal with.

Reading the whole article makes it seem like a case of a behemoth steel plant of the past that is in need of a streamline.

Currently Gary Ind makes Detroit look like a world class city,nothing left there and they might be a little bit more hungry.

But they are not the only ones and it looks like Gary is becoming the Pittsburgh of the past.

GARY, IND. [[AP) — AN Illinois steel company has finalized plans to move its operations to northwestern Indiana .

https://www.chicagotribune.com/busin...205-story.html

[Cincinnati_Kid]

But that can't possibly be! Just Wed. nite in Battle Creek, Prez Lardazz said steel is back!

"Look what I’ve done for steel. I mean, the steel is back. We taxed all the dumb steel coming in from China and other places, and US steel mills are doing great — they’re expanding all over the country, and they were gonna be out of business within two years the way they were going."

Just more lies, and misinformation from Dump. Never seen anyone as arrogant, and pompous as this guy.

[401don]

Just more lies, and misinformation from Dump. Never seen anyone as arrogant, and pompous as this guy.

It's absolutely frightening how brain dead his followers are at his rallies. Watching him say John Dingell may be looking up and seeing both young and older people behind him just giggling.

[Maof]

'Thriving again'

During an Aug. 13 speech in Monaca, Pennsylvania, at a Royal Dutch Shell petrochemical plant, Trump said that his steel and aluminum tariffs were a big success. The president had the authority to enact the 25% steel and 10% aluminum tariffs on his own, without congressional approval, by citing national security.
"The steel companies are thriving again," Trump said. "Those steel mills — U.S. Steel and all of them, all of them — they’re expanding all over the place."
A spokeswoman declined to comment Friday about the layoffs or effect of the Trump tariffs beyond the company's official announcements.


https://www.freep.com/story/money/bu...fs/2712706001/

[Dumpling]

There used to be a descriptive name for each coal pile on Zug Island.
"Kepler" and "Mingo Logan" were two of these names. "Mingo" is a Native American term designating a chief. The names of the coal piles
were likely the names of the mines that the coal in the pile originated
from.
Yoopers will know that much of the iron ore pellets at Zug are brought
to Zug from Marquette, Michigan in the Upper Peninsula - this
can be verified by using the MarineTraffic site.

[Richard]

But that can't possibly be! Just Wed. nite in Battle Creek, Prez Lardazz said steel is back!

"Look what I’ve done for steel. I mean, the steel is back. We taxed all the dumb steel coming in from China and other places, and US steel mills are doing great — they’re expanding all over the country, and they were gonna be out of business within two years the way they were going."

So do some research and show where what he said was wrong,the steel industry is in flex after 40 years of neglect and failure to upgrade and innovate.

In 2011 the Germans built a 5 billion dollar mill in Alabama on 3500 acres that does everything the 100 year old Zug Island did at probably half the cost of production.

Lots of micro mills have opened up because of the rise in demand,they are efficient and with new technologies they can produce the equivalent of a massive plant.

Did they not re-open a long idled mill in the UP?

Common sense dictates that importing cheap steel through Canada where the workers are paid $20 a day makes it hard for US Steel companies to compete,everybody complaining about US workers working low wage jobs but yet doing everything in thier power to make sure those jobs are not obtainable.

Not shure what Trump has to do with the closing of a 100 year old plant that would cost more to upgrade then to build new that nobody seems to want around in the first place.

Maybe look at it is a sign of the city changing from it industrial roots?

[Lowell]

I'm wondering if that Mingo Logan coal pile relates to Mingo Junction, a steel town on the Monongahela River above Pittsburgh. If you have ever seen the classic movie "Deerhunter" you have seen Mingo Junction as it was the chief set for the first half of the movie.

I attended a wedding in Pittsburgh in Sep. and used the opportunity to drive up the Monongahela and its succession of tired steel towns, including Mingo Junction. It was a parade of mini-Gary's, one tired depopulated town after another.

[Richard]

Pittsburg has come a long way since their collapse.

I remember when in northern Minnesota the taconite mines and trains ran 24/7 now the mines have been replaced with casinos.

In the 1980s we went down this road with the Japanese and gave the steel industry a bailout.

I was going to explain to my students that U.S. steel companies should not get support from the federal government because Japanese manufacturers were importing both coal and iron ore, converting them to steel, and exporting the finished product to the U.S. at a price that was lower than the cost of production of U.S. steel companies. It was clear evidence of the inability of U.S. steel producers to compete primarily because of their excessively high labor costs.

https://pjmedia.com/blog/rick-santor...tten-a-bailout

The UK has also debated the government bailout of its steel industry after it was also decimated.

The steel mills now are kinda like the auto companies in the past,computers and automation have brought down the need for the amount of employees of the past.

Sometimes I wonder about the long term impacts of our quest in de industrialization,the jobs that replace them do not seem as supportive financial wise as a whole.

Detroit of the past being a three horse town may have been its saving grace when you do see those one horse devastated towns,the emptiness and thoughts driving though them is sad.

The old coal mining towns are the same,a couple of people living in a town that once supported thousands,in the heat of the summer it is cooler to head to the mountains for some exploring.

[Lowell]

Pittsburgh is indeed back. Its downtown is vibrant and fully occupied, streets full of pedestrians.

If one thinks about it, and can move beyond the 20th Century sentimentality of equating steel production with power and might, steel is something better done elsewhere. It is polluting, dangerous to workers, loud and messy. I have seen it first hand working on Zug Island and in trips through the Mahoning Valley in Ohio [Youngstown et. al], Gary, and the recent Monongahela tour.

All are ecologically damaged as are its workers and the desperate worn-out depopulated areas are left behind.

[Dumpling]

"Marfork" was the name of another coal pile on Zug Island.

I don't really have any idea exactly which parts of America's coal
country this coal came from.

Google Maps shows Marfork to be in West Virginia.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Ma...!4d-81.4549084

Just guessing, but it looks like the coal on Zug was coming from West
Virginia. Certainly it could have come from other states as well.

Hope everything goes well for the soon-to-be laid off US Steel
workers [[work neighbors). It will be interesting to know of Plan
B for Zug Island. There may need to be an environmental
cleanup sooner rather than later if it is about to be inundated
due to a rising Detroit River water level. Zug Island is the
location of the main Detroit Wastewater Plant outfall [[aka
DRO-1 or Detroit River Outfall One).

[Richard]

^ pretty cool info on the naming of the piles.

West Virginia coal is different in that it burns cleaner and does not have that sooty smudge like a lot of the dirtier coal,I guess it is like the Cadillac of coals.

I think they get a bad rap because everybody equates coal as coal and dirty,if West Virginia could be the sole provider it probably would have zero environmental impact,but the other coal producing states would not allow it politically.

Our power plant was run on coal,and they owned the coal mines to supply it,every day twice the coal trains would come through.

The city sold the plant and mines 3 years ago and it was converted to natural gas but you cannot really tell the difference in what is coming out of the stacks.

The article said it was idling the plant and it did not say they were phasing it out,there is a national Security aspect on being able to maintain or ramp up production in an emergency.

[Cincinnati_Kid]

'Thriving again'

During an Aug. 13 speech in Monaca, Pennsylvania, at a Royal Dutch Shell petrochemical plant, Trump said that his steel and aluminum tariffs were a big success. The president had the authority to enact the 25% steel and 10% aluminum tariffs on his own, without congressional approval, by citing national security.
"The steel companies are thriving again," Trump said. "Those steel mills — U.S. Steel and all of them, all of them — they’re expanding all over the place."
A spokeswoman declined to comment Friday about the layoffs or effect of the Trump tariffs beyond the company's official announcements.


https://www.freep.com/story/money/bu...fs/2712706001/

Well of course they don't have a comment.... because "Pinocchio" told another lie.

[Cincinnati_Kid]

Pittsburgh is indeed back. Its downtown is vibrant and fully occupied, streets full of pedestrians.

If one thinks about it, and can move beyond the 20th Century sentimentality of equating steel production with power and might, steel is something better done elsewhere. It is polluting, dangerous to workers, loud and messy. I have seen it first hand working on Zug Island and in trips through the Mahoning Valley in Ohio [Youngstown et. al], Gary, and the recent Monongahela tour.

All are ecologically damaged as are its workers and the desperate worn-out depopulated areas are left behind.

Good analysis. Pittsburgh moved away from steel, and has a more service oriented economy.