DETROIT — In a bid to link its historic past with its future products, Ford Motor said on Thursday that it had chosen a site near downtown Detroit as the base for a high-level team working on self-driving and electric cars.

By relocating the group from its corporate campus in nearby Dearborn, Ford is embracing its Motor City roots and creating an urban work environment similar to a Silicon Valley start-up.

It is the latest in a series of strategic moves by Ford, the nation’s second-biggest automaker after General Motors, to accelerate its development of battery-powered vehicles and driverless technology.

Ford has long been a major presence in southeastern Michigan with its headquarters and factories, but the company has had minimal operations in Detroit — where its founder, Henry Ford, built a Model T assembly plant more than a century ago.