This post was authored by Alexis Zimberg.



Another historic Detroit building burned to the ground on Saturday, this time in the Oakman Boulevard Historic District of Highland Park. The 100,000 square foot former Sanders Confectionary Headquarters set ablaze around 4:30 in the morning and continued to rage until the evening, leaving in its wake a massive cloud of black smoke visible from 10 miles away. The dark gloom hanging over M-10 particularly caught our attention because the burning building is located within the same square block as the recently-renovated Michigan Bell Telephone Building. Thankfully firefighters successfully kept the flames contained within the sole warehouse. Meanwhile Police on the peripheries of Oakman Boulevard seemed focused on ticketing photographers (us included), which we hope was for safety reasons. Though the building was long left unoccupied, it is still sad to lose a Detroit-area institution to flames. The cause of the fire is currently under investigation and no casualties were reported.

To recap, it has been a hot summer for Detroit building fires. Both Imagination Station and the Former Detroit Trucking Company Building were targeted by flames in the last month. This was also the summer that a start-up private bus company began to try to provide an alternative to our public transit woes.... anyone else see the potential for a start-up indie volunteer fire department? We are sure we can find someone to graffiti a rad truck.

· Fire at Historic Sanders Facility [MLive]

· Imagination Station Re-Groups Post Fire [Curbed Detroit]

· Michigan Bell Telephone Building Soldiers on Sans Telephone [Curbed Detroit]

· Detroit Bus Company [Official]