Man Who Walked Miles To Work Settles Into New Life

TROY (WWJ/AP) - About a year after his story was first reported, a Detroit-area man who said he walked 21 miles a day to and from work is finding life is much easier after receiving a new car and a windfall of donations.

The Detroit Free Press reported last year about James Robertson's daily trek to the factory where he worked in Rochester Hills.

A local college student launched a modest crowdfunding campaign to a buy a new car. It led to $360,000 eventually being raised and Robertson receiving a new, $35,000 Ford Taurus from an auto dealership.

"I may have been born there, but God knows I don't belong there anymore," Robertson said about his old neighborhood near Detroit's New Center area.

The plastic-molding operator also said he didn't tell people in his old neighborhood where he was moving.

He still works at the same factory in Rochester Hills which pays him $10.55 an hour, but the hours-long walking trip now is done in a 20-minute drive.

The newspaper reported Sunday the new situation hasn't rid 57-year-old Robinson of all of life's problems. They include a need to find new friends and fit into a new neighborhood, and a wish to lose weight now that his body is usually at rest.

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