Urban Exploration & Abandoned Places

Recent mention of abandoned train stations sent me down a very enjoyable rabbit hole today, and I spent many hours looking at cool sites about long forgotten buildings. Of course, the first rule of UrbEx, much like Fisticuffs League, is you don't talk about it. Being that this is very hard to do, the next best thing is to not advertise or promote trespassing, so this post will be about places that other people have explored and we will assume that they had permission from the land owners to do so.

By far, the coolest site I found for local stuff is a blog called BullCityDiscard. This guy has a great eye for photography and really captures the essence of these locations. He also gives a decent backstory, which is always cool to give some context to the images. 

I also found an abandoned castle built in 2005 (! not a typo) located about 15mi north of Durham. 

Another guy's site where he has photos of local places, some of which are no longer around. Not a lot  of detail but still interesting.

So let's see some cool abandoned places that you have found, on the internet or otherwise. Don't post exact locations or anything illegal.

I wonder how many of these places are legal to go in and see

This stuff is all over you-tube.  The Proper People is a good channel; they seem to be pretty respectful of the places they find.  There's also some crazy European crew who snuck into a Russian military base to find their failed "shuttle" project.  

There’s an old railroad roundhouse back home that we spent hours upon hours st as kids. Many of the buildings & cool junk are gone now, but a little over half of the engine house remains. I got some pics there a few years ago & our oldest daughter took her senior pics there. 

In reply to mikeatrpi :

We watch a lot of the proper people. Great channel and I'd agree with the respectful part.

I love a bit of urbex when I get a chance. Abandoned factories and houses tend to be my favorites.

I did a failed amusement park called the magical kingdom a while back, it's so run down and reclaimed by nature.

Here's a few of the better pictures I got, not much left these days, other than a stack of snakes and mosquitoes

Here's an ad from whenit was open, cheesy goodness haha

Pete: That round fender truck, though!

Lake Crabtree park (not exactly and abandoned place) has an old homestead in it. The house is gone, but the bulb flowers that led up to the walk 100s of years ago still bloom in double lines. I thought that was cool.

There are abandoned millstones in Umstead.

You have to get outside the city to really find abandoned places, though. I wish I had the time for it.



 

My friends had an apartment in RI that was a converted mill. There was one abandoned brick building on the property that was tempting but I knew better than to hop the fence. 

This place always interested me as a young adult: 

https://www.theartofdoingstuff.com/for-sale-1-historic-buildingthe-deluxe/

In reply to daeman :

Abandoned parks and playgrounds have to be the most depressing things, ever.  

More like a _BE_musement park!

Dusterbd13 said:

I wonder how many of these places are legal to go in and see

Not very many. 

One of my favorite Google searches on this topic is “abandoned soviet.”  That turns up some neat stuff from that era.

“Abandoned Olympic” is a good one too.  Ex olympic sites that have fallen into disrepair.

In reply to volvoclearinghouse :

It definitely held a certain level of sad eeriness about it. Knowing so many kids and families had great times there and now it's just slowly disappearing back into nature was rather sobering. 

Abandoned houses where it's as if someone went out one day and never came home are the ones that really get to me though.

One of our regular autocross sites is at a abandoned amusement park. As tempting as it would be to wander, we do our best to keep people out so we don't lose the site. 

Google earth image.

In my wandering I've shot a few pictures. 

A couple of more. 

There is a fairly large fireplace on the side of Route 64. I can only imagine it was a large house or in, back when that road was a cart path. It's been a while since I've looked at it. 

I went to an abandoned amusement park about 10 years ago to explore. My sister had been there previously before an arsonist burned down the ballroom. Apparently it is still somewhat there, the land has been for sale for a long time but nothing has been done. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chippewa_Lake_Park

Hard to resist the temptations of abandoned places.

volvoclearinghouse said:

In reply to daeman :

Abandoned parks and playgrounds have to be the most depressing things, ever.  

More like a _BE_musement park!

Or berkeleying terrifying, courtesy of the Prypiat (Churnobyl) amusement park.  

Abandon amusement parks are where all the serial killers hang out. Don't you guys know anything?

PS, I really want that rusty baby face thing to hang on the wall in my shop. 

I love these places too. Deer Lodge MT has a prison museum thats pretty creepy and abandoned, plus is hooked to a great car museum

D2W said:

PS, I really want that rusty baby face thing to hang on the wall in my shop. 

Pretty sure you don't want the radiation that comes with it. 

In reply to Appleseed :

Have you learned nothing from fallout 4? Radiation is fine!

At least until you turn into a ghoul.....

I just want to go ride places like a lot of those on the BMX.