About 800 workers are back to work at the U.S. Steel Corp. mill in Granite City, Ill., which had been idled since December.
The steel industry has been battered by the drop in automobile sales and construction work.
About 1,600 workers lost their jobs when Pittsburgh-based U.S. Steel idled the Granite City mill in December.
Then the company idled its coke operations in February, laying off another 390 workers.
Granite City Mayor Ed Hagnauer had said he was optimistic the idling wouldn’t turn into a permanent closure because U.S. Steel continued its $600 million upgrades on the mill.
Granite City Works, the city's biggest employer, had more than 2,200 workers when it was fully operational.
Source: Biz Journals
