The Rust Belt

Streamline Architects

Recognitions: AIA Iowa Impact Award 2020

Project Description

In 1927 in East Moline, laid the IH Global Case Plant. At its peak, the plant employed 4,300 workers, producing 40-50 combines a day. In 2000, IH announced that it would close the East Moline plant. When the last combine rolled off the line on June 27, 2004, it left behind 54 acres of building and 570 remaining employees without a job. The once 200-acre development is now home to a hotel, an event center, and has plans for much more, thanks to Larry Anderson, owner of East Moline Glass. This sparked Anderson to look at other buildings in East Moline, leading him to the former Moline-Knight Automobile building. The skinny and long stretch of building had sat vacant for more than 10 years until it met its fate: The Rust Belt. While Anderson considered tearing the building down, more than one century later, the former automobile manufacturing plant is the newest addition to unique venues in the Quad Cities. The Rust Belt accommodates approximately 4,000 people and provides the opportunity for musicians, comedians, and other artists to entertain audiences in the Quad Cities region. The Rust Belt is not only unique for East Moline, it is unique for the entire Midwest. The once run-down building is now filled with booming businesses such as a restaurant, brewery, coffee house, hair salon and barbershop, a photography studio, a gym, a retail store, an architecture firm, and a fabrication shop. The addition of The Rust Belt has sparked a movement in East Moline and has reignited the transformation of this development as well as the surrounding approximately 200-acre development. In East Moline, the average household income is $46,506. The addition of The Rust Belt has added 75 new jobs and counting and six new businesses to East Moline.