Detroit's now-empty Joe Louis Arena will finally get a date with the wrecking ball this spring, just shy of its 40th year.

Demolition of the arena is expected to begin in the next four to six weeks and finish by the end of the year or early 2020, said Detroit Building Authority Director Tyrone Clifton.

There will be no Pontiac Silverdome-style implosion of the downtown riverfront arena, but rather a gradual disassembly process involving heavy machinery. Demolition crews will start by disassembling the arena's interior, such as ceiling beams, then proceed to the exterior by June or July, Clifton said.

Detroit-based Adamo Group is doing the demolition under a $5.9 million contract with the city.

"So if you are just driving by or walking by, maybe you will hear it but you won't see anything (at first) on the exterior coming down," he said.

Once home to the Red Wings and countless other sporting events, concerts and the 1980 Republican National Convention, Joe Louis Arena opened in December 1979, replacing the Olympia Stadium and successfully keeping the Wings from relocating to Pontiac.

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It hosted its final hockey game in April 2017. The Red Wings now play in the new Little Caesars Arena that they share with the Pistons.

Most anything of value was cleared out of Joe Louis Arena last spring and went to auction, including old seats ($150 each), signs, even metal trough urinalsand bathroom stalls. Now stripped clean, the arena is ready for its final disposition.

"You go in there, it's just a shell of a building," Clifton said. "It's time to disassemble it."

The city is financially responsible for the arena's demolition under a deal with a former creditor, New York-based Financial Guaranty Insurance Co., which accepted future ownership and development rights to the 5-acre site — plus that of the nearby 3,200-space arena garage — in exchange for swallowing big losses during Detroit's 2013-14 municipal bankruptcy.

The creditor ultimately got roughly 13 cents on the dollar for its $1.1-billion claim against the city.

The city is financing the demolition work through a $10-million, 20-year loan from the Michigan Strategic Fund. Other demolition expenses include $3.5 million for hazardous materials abatement, which is now underway, as well as various demolition design and administrative work.

There have been no public announcements yet for what would replace The Joe.

Financial Guaranty Insurance Corp. has until January 2020 to submit to the city its redevelopment plans for the arena site.

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The firm's subsidiary had sued the city last year to extend its original fall 2017 deadline for the redevelopment plan and gain the flexibility to build something other than the required "first-class" hotel with at least 300 rooms.

The dispute ultimately went to arbitration.

People Mover stop?

The demolition isn't expected to affect operation of the People Mover. The People Mover's Joe Louis Arena stop will remain even after the arena is gone, as the stop also serves the nearby Riverfront Towers residential complex.

However, the pedestrian bridge between the stop and the arena that passes over Steve Yzerman Drive will be taken down, Clifton said.

The 3,200-space Joe Louis Arena parking garage also will stay put. The garage — currently closed — could possibly be reopened in the future, he said.

Adamo knockdown

Adamo has experience razing old sports venues.

In December 2017 the contractor brought down much of the Pontiac Silverdome using explosives and imploded the Georgia Dome early that same year. (The Silverdome job, however, required two explosion attempts after faulty wiring marred the first go.)

An Adamo representative did not return a call seeking comment about its plans for Joe Louis Arena.

The memories

The Joe will undoubtedly live on in the memories of many metro Detroiters.

The arena saw the Red Wings clinch two of their four most recent Stanley Cups, as well as the night of April 27, 1984, when the Pistons' Isiah Thomas scored an astounding 16 points in 93 seconds in a playoff game against the New York Knicks.

It also was the setting of a raucous concert in 1989 — immortalized in the film "Straight Outta Compton" — in which the rap group N.W.A. defiantly performed its controversial song "F--- tha Police" during an evening in which nine adults and nine juveniles were arrested outside the show.

The last public event at Joe Louis Arena was the WWE's SummerSlam in late July 2017, where wrestling superstar John Cena body-slammed a 304-pound Bulgarian through a wooden cafeteria table.

ContactJC Reindl: 313-222-6631 or jcreindl@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @jcreindl. Read more on business and sign up for our business newsletter.