Three Decades of Gears: Inside Honda's Ohio Transmission Milestone

In Russells Point, Ohio, a factory that has quietly powered millions of Honda vehicles just turned 30. The Honda Transmission Plant, which opened in 1996 to build four-speed automatics, now cranks out continuously variable transmissions (CVTs) for the Civic, Accord, and CR-V, plus the two-motor hybrid systems that drive those models and the new Prelude.

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The plant's story starts earlier. S. assembly line in Marysville began building Accords with Japanese parts three years earlier. By the 1990s, demand was so high that Honda needed a dedicated transmission facility. The Russells Point site opened with four-speed automatics, then moved to five-speeds in the mid-2000s, six-speeds in 2010, and eventually to today's CVTs and hybrid systems.

Notably, the plant never built manual transmissions, a nod to the American market's preference for automatics.

Today, the plant is part of a tight cluster of five Honda facilities northwest of Columbus, including engine production in Anna, assembly in Marysville and East Liberty, a test track, and a performance center. Honda has invested over $1 billion in the Russells Point site, which now produces more than one million transmissions and 500,000 hybrid systems annually.

5 billion. "We're not just reflecting on our history; we're accelerating toward the future," said Jason Foster, the plant's power unit manufacturing lead. As Honda ships hybrid systems back to Japan for the Prelude, the Ohio plant proves that 30 years of shifting gears is just the beginning.