Credits: Photo by 9709151@N04 on Flickr
Credits: Photo by Curreyuk on Flickr
Credits: Photo by 9709151 on Flickr
Credits: Photo by Curreyuk on Flickr
Credits: Photo by Curreyuk on Flickr
Credits: Photo by Curreyuk on Flickr
Kolmanskuppe, Namibia
Kolmannskuppe is a ghost town in southern Namibia. It was a small mining village and is now a popular tourist destination run by the joint firm NAMDEB (Namibia-De Beers).
It developed after the discovery of diamonds in the area in 1908, to provide shelter for workers from the harsh environment of the Namib Desert. The village was built like a German town, with facilities like a hospital, ballroom, power station, school, skittle-alley, theater and sport-hall, casino, ice factory and the first x-ray-station in the southern hemisphere.
The town declined after World War I as diamond prices crashed, and operations moved to Oranjemund. It was abandoned in 1956 but has since been partly restored. The geological forces of the desert mean that tourists can now walk through houses knee-deep in sand.
Credits: Photo by Tobiasasser on Flickr
Credits: Photo by Tobiasasser on Flickr
Credits: Photo by 12464238@N08 on Flickr
Credits: Photo by Tobiasasser on Flickr
Credits: Photo by Calips96 on Flickr
Credits: Photo by Geoftheref on Flickr
Credits: Photo by Geoftheref on Flickr
Humberstone, Chile
In 1872, the Guillermo Wendell Nitrate Extraction Company founded the saltpeter works of Santa Laura in the same year the “Peru Nitrate Company” was founded. Both works grew quickly, becoming busy towns characterized by lovely buildings in the English style.
The economic model collapsed during the Great Depression of 1929 because of the development of the synthesis of ammonia, which led to the industrial production of fertilizers. Both works were abandoned in 1960 and in 1970, after becoming ghost towns, they were declared national monuments and opened to tourism. In 2005 they were declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO.
Credits: Photo by Dulconte on Flickr
Credits: Photo by Seballek on Flickr
Credits: Photo by Patorojas on Flickr
Credits: Photo by Rianvanu on Flickr
Credits: Photo by Monky on Flickr
Credits: Photo by Aotarola on Flickr
Wittenoom, Australia
Wittenoom is a locality in the Pilbara region of Western Australia. During the 1950s, Wittenoom was the Pilbara’s biggest town, but was shut down in 1966 due to health concerns from asbestos mining at the nearby Wittenoom Gorge.
Today it is a ghost town with approximately eight residents who receive no government services. The town’s name was removed from official maps and the roads leading to contaminated areas are likely to be closed.
Credits: Photo by Intervene on Flickr
Credits: Photo by Intervene on Flickr
Credits: Photo by Velden on Flickr
Credits: Photo by Velden on Flickr
Credits: Photo by Velden on Flickr
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{ 118 comments… read them below or add one }
What about creating touristic places at those places
Hi,
Checkout these Irish abandoned places –
Ireland’s Abandoned Ruins Collection:
A collection of hauntingly atmospheric photographs which focuses on timeworn subjects that were once vibrant but are now in the process of being lost to the ages and reclaimed by nature.
http://www.ciaranmchugh.com/page3.htm
Amazing collection…great unknown thing became known to me…:)
Horrible over worked HDR rubbish.
Check this website! http://aliciariusphotography.com
Is awesome!
i dont think that would be a good idea.. i like having these places like they are.. untouched and creepy, tourists would ruin these places
This is a very interesting topic.
Your pictures are very beautiful.
I love it. Thumbs up for this.
I found very interesting these posts
very cool
because it brings a feeling that the world ended
Thank you for donig this. I love photography and i love abandoned places. I couldn’t imagine leaving behind some of the stuff and places that get left behind. thanks again.
Beautiful photos. They convey well the eerie solitude of these abandoned places. I have been to Centralia, PA, USA before. The smoke rising up through the ground, the few remaining houses/buildings and the decrepit roadways leave one with the feeling that they have entered another world.
Excellent “travel” via your web site. Used Google Maps and Wikipedia to round-out information on each site.
Have bookmarked “Abandoned Places in the World” and the main page, http://www.dirjournal.com, under my Travel folder for future visits.
Thanks for providing these wonderful pictures and information!
Great article. I work with a photographer called Dan Dobowitz and edited one of his books on Wastelands – flick through to his work on Ellis Island here: http://www.civicworks.net/books/01-wastelands-2000-2006/ .
He has a fantastic series on Italy’s facist modernist ruins as well (just a fascinating piece of history) here: http://www.civicworks.net/books/03-fascismo-abbandonato—english/
well shit i just hate how yall surfering………8)
Should turn half these places into paintball fields.
these are some of the most beautiful places, and would love to visit on day.
Wonderful pictures, a bit creepy, but very beautiful. Especially the italian villages. Sad stories behind some unfortunatelly, but a nice try to make sth nice from sth bad as an abandoned city.
This is very very rare post. Not many a times does one get to see such pics. Great job.
Surprised that St Kilda is not here. A remote Scottish island off the West coast was inhabited until the 1920s when all the people were evacuated due to starvation. A lot of the young men were killed during WW1 and the people left were unable to sustain their crofting economy. There are pictures available showing the evacuation and resulting empty crofts.
It’s a shame about Varosha,Cyprus.This ghost town should be handed back to it’s former residents,so that it can be restored back to it’s former glory.It should have people holidaying,living and working there,not laying derelict and abandoned like it has for the past 35 years. It is pointless keeping this city empty,fill it with life.
Really enjoyed this nice work
this is a remarkable collection. perfect angles and soul. thank you for this.
Although most of these stories are intriguing & eerie, I particularly like the underground mine fire because that to me is extraordinary considering fire that burns underground.
Very beautiful places. I only saw Pripyat before, I didn’t know there are other so abandoned places. I wish to see at least one of them.
wow. thanks.. I am a fan of ghost towns but I am constricted to the US. due to financial concerns.
beautiful pictures–good find and nice write up
I didn’t see a single ghost.
I want my money back.
check out gilman, co – an awesome abandoned mining town
Fantastic! Incredible posting and thanks so much for it. I’m a 40 year real estate professional who sells real estate all across the US at auction, was telling someone this evening that we are now seeing so many abandoned buildings and even developments that we were going to have more modern day ghost towns and their reply was no once you build something there will always be people there. I can’t wait to show them these photos.
Love the pics, Ghost Towns are my grandson’s favourit picture. He will love them,
Thanks
Ismael
In 1969, for a period of several months, I was the officer-in-charge of the Hong Kong Police Force ‘s Kowloon Walled City Patrol Unit. The enclave’s legal status lay in a grey area, as it had been excluded from the Sino-British treaty ceding the Kowloon Peninsula to the Brits, and policing was only at a token level; hence the abundance of illicit activities, though “cocaine parlours” were certainly not among them. Heroin divans, to the contrary, were plentiful. The area was also renowned for its unregistered dental clinics, many of which were shockingly brutal and unhygienic, operated by quack dentists. While on patrol, it was not uncommon to have a pot of excrement dumped on one from above. Suffice to say, that period of my service was not a highlight of my police career!
I just visit the park that replaced the hong kong walled city over the winter. my dad was telling me all kinds of stories just like yours cause he lived there.
publish some photos of
oklahoma,US,towns abandoned on Interstate35
Someone has to shoot a movie in these places.
the japanese pics at the top remind me of the video game Fallout 3
What, nothing on Detroit?
Wow awesome finds…look like maps from first person shooter games were modeled after these.
What a great site. I started discovering ghost towns throughout Texas and the Western United States as a motorcycle rider and have been to over 100. Now I guess I have a new, more expensive goal…
Prefigures global wasteland following series of high-altitude Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) attacks devastating urban agglomerations. By end of current 1.8-million year Pleistocene Era some 12-million years hence, traces of human efflorescence will be limited to deep-cut highway excavations networking blob-like, knobbly mounds.
Extradite Soetoro!
Check out http://www.gwalia.org.au
An Australian gold mining town once home to approx 4000 people including US president Herbert Hoover. Now about 25 people and 40 buildings remain.
Nice photos, and cool topic. Too bad you left out Detroit.
San Zhi, were GOLDEN NINJA WARRIOR’s finaI fight takes pIace!
I can confirm what Honkytowner said of the Kowloon Walled City. I was a Patrol Sub-unit Commander in Kowloon City Division of the RHKP in 1974. Each Sub-unit had a dedicated Walled City patrol of a Sergeant and 2 or 3 Constables. I recall an escaping opium smoker landing on my head during an early winter morning raid on a divan but no turds! The park is a huge improvement!
I wonder what these cities will look like in 3000 years.
Get out!! this is my place…….. I am watching you
it’s interesting to see how some of these monument-like, abandoned habitats started off as utopias. And now diminished into forgotten wastelands and forsaken memories – a somewhat dystopia.
how living spaces are conjured up, by design function or other circumstance, it is truly amazing to see how these habitats unfolded then. How was each individual’s experience in each of this different environments? All of which had their distinct unique qualities!
and in revealing them now, we definitely perceive them differently. They serve different purpose/functions now (i.e. tourist hot spots, a historian’s field trip destination, etc).
My question is – should these landscapes be lost with their belonging memories or do we rethink how to harness and utilise these somewhat extraordinary habits/environments again?
Or could all of this inspire an architecture designed to serve its function purposefully and dies out literally as demand diminishes – fading into the blowing winds like a memory wantinng to be forgot.
Came across ths website quite by accident and was surprised to see the town, or, Ghost Town, where I grew up, on your list. Centralia, PA. Despite the fire, it was a wonderful place to grow up. Very closely knit community. A decent place to live and raise children. Thanks for the posting.
Anyone else notice that COD4 modern warfare definitely used the same building in chernobyl?
I was just thinking the same thing. The picture of the ferris wheel had given me a good chuckle. I emailed my son the website so that he too could see that the developers of these games do use real world things when making the games.
That’s because they were in fighting in Pripyat. Remember the radiation warnings? Yes, the game got it right, and pretty true to scale for a game.
I still remember the first time I saw pictures of the abandoned city of Pripyat, a chill ran up my spine. The ferris wheel was the kicker. I called for my son, whom plays COD also, and had him look at the pictures. He was 4 years old a the time. He said, “Dad, that’s the city from Call Of Duty!”
Sweet.
=]
Check out Times Beach (Missouri), abandoned due to dioxin contamination in about 1990.
John Cramer Says:
November 9th, 2009 at 4:26 pm
Anyone else notice that COD4 modern warfare definitely used the same building in chernobyl?
Yeah I did, the big wheel is pretty much tke same.
Just when you think all of the planet is filled with people it’s nice to know that everything belongs to the earth in the end. The larger towns that are abandoned are really creepy. It would be a good ghost hunt. Thank you for taking these photos for those of us who may never get to visit these sights.
Thankyou for all these fascinating photos. I’m partcularly well aquainted with Varosha, since my sister is a journalist who lives in Cyprus, and I’ve visited it (as close as is possible without getting shot!) several times. How on earth did you manage to take some of those photos without getting hauled off in the back of a Turkish army van?!Dear, fascinating old place- it never changes. I’ve met several of my sister’s colleagues who have been inside the place to do special features about it, and many of the tales about it remaining exactly as it was left, really are true. Whilst the Turkish Army did indeed loot it extensively following the invasion of ’74, it’s so big (about the size of Worcester) that they couldn’t possibly appropriate all the contents of all it’s buildings. Hundreds of homes remain full of their owner’s things- shops still stock 1974 goods- hotel restaurants are still laid for breakfast- pubs & bars remain stocked with old brands like Dubonnet, Double Diamond and Worthington E (the Turks wouldn’t touch alcohol, being Muslims) with the jukeboxes loaded with tracks by Deep Purple, Redbone and Santana- and lovely old ’60s & early ’70s cars (by now classics, all of ‘em) remain waiting in their garages. Drunken UN squaddies have done some damage with vandalism, though things have been tightened up now considerably.
My hope is that eventually, it too will become protected by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site. Many abandoned cities & towns quickly decay, becoming just a jumble of walls and rotting timber, but Varosha is almost unique in that it’s so complete and has survived so well (Pripyat in Ukraine being the only other place to compare with it). I think the Mediterranean climate has a lot to do with it, plus the fact that unlike most examples of foreign beach resort architecture, it was actually very well built and remains pretty solid.
Meanwhile, there she basks in the Cypriot sun, guarding her treasures for future generations. Re. the photograph featuring the beach umbrellas, the tall building to the far right of the picture has the bizarre name of the Twiga Tower, and is one of Varosha’s smaller and cheaper hotels. Of quite outstanding ugliness, it deserves to be preserved for it’s very hideosity alone- many of it’s rooms remain in a good state of decoration, as can be seen from outside, and some even still have glass in their windows. Just in front of it is it’s small, kidney-shaped swimming pool, which when I last saw it was occupied by a large blue plastic barrel!
A note to readers: tempting though it is to think of having a good old explore of Varosha, DONT- it’s VERY dangerous to do so. The area remains technically held by the Turkish military, and although it is actually patrolled by the UN for most of the time, the Turks guard it’s integrity very jealously. On neither side of the divide are you allowed to take photos, though the Greeks tolerate observation through binoculars. The Turks don’t even allow that, and whilst an incursion in the Greek half would just result in ejection and a loud telling-off by UN guards, entry from the Turkish sector could result in arrest, detention, or even being shot at on sight. The only persons allowed in are Turkish and UN personnel, visiting dignitaries, or journalists under special escort.
In addition, many of the buildings are now infested with vermin, and poisonous snakes have adopted parts of it as a breeding ground- thus the potential for disease is considerable.
Oradour-sur-Glane, France Your last picture is near Limoges north west
about 30 km
I,ve been there,
too bad you only show one picture.
the new town of oradour was rebuilt beside the old town
the french left it this way
as a memorial to the dead
The Germans destroyed it in ww2
in retaliation for killing some germans in an other
area
This town was off the beaten track
this in the book 10 great atrocities of man
http://www.scrapbookpages.com/oradour-sur-glane/Story/OfficialStory.html
i should have looked this up before my last comment sorry
this is about the last picture.
Thank you,
very interesting article
Some of those pictures are amazing. gives you a real feel of it all. Thanks very interesting!
If you want to read more about Centralia, Pa, and the underground mine fire that turned it into a ghost town, check out my new book, Fire Underground: The Ongoing Tragedy of the Centralia Mine Fire (Globe Pequot Press, 2009). Available from Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Books-A-Million, and Borders, as well as other fine online booksellers and not a few brick & mortar stores.
Hey David
Many thanks for posting that info about your book, I’m putting that on my wish list with Amazon right now. ” All I want for Christmas is a few good books”. I’m a WV native and find stories about the coal fields very interesting and look foward to reading yours.
Excellent List!
OOOOOhhhh!!!!!AWESOME PICS!!WELL DONE!GREAT!
Hello lovers of abandoned places, here are some more pix & leads : http://snaporaz.posterous.com/tag/abandonedplaces
Nice photos and this is very rare but interesting topic.. Perhaps some of us never know there’re places like this.
the author says “following the discovery of gold in 1859.” i cannot let that pass, as the san francisco 49ers are named because gold was discovered in california in 1849.
It’s not just the places, but the feeling that these ruins are left standing with so many stories trapped within its walls, waiting to get out. Amazing pics.
Wow – I stumbled on this blog after returning from Marrakech and looking for somewhere interesting but QUIET to visit – I had no idea there were so many abandoned towns all over the world, truely fascinating and quite sad to see. Money, greed and lack of respect for fellow humans seams to be the main culprit.
This has given me a morbid curiosity to see some of these places, and yet I want to leave well alone at the same time.
You have found some fab images.
Kath – UK
amazing pics of some amazing places, i have recently visited an abandoned military hosptital (the cambridge hospital) in aldershot hants uk, very interesting and would highly recomend paying a visit.
i thought it was very well done i like what u do hope to see more again
really enjoyed this amazing stuff
Neat!
Your photos are very interesting. I was in Chernobile (Ukraine), where a similar atmosphere.
these pics should be so amazing but are so not. Not a feeling of anything, just a person with a camera. very disappointed. Just goes to show just because you have a camera and take a pic does not make you a photographer, you either have “something” or you don’t. Not one of these rocks. Bummer I was looking to get a couple purchased and have blown up for my offices, anyone else have some talent that took some of this area?
Marion,
I guess all of us are different, but this site as well as others I find fascinating. I wish I had the time to tour many of these places that still exist with my view camera and photograph them from different perspectives. Unfortunately even for those who can go to these places access to make dramatic photos may not be possible. I have filmed in abandoned mines, buildings and factories and for safety reasons I have many snap-shot quality photos and not many quality photographs as seen travel publications. However, in any case what is provided on this site is still very interesting and nicely done.
Each one has their own perspectives… the photographs are amazing indeed and these are not jus layman pics, it provides lot of information bout the place… the view is awesome and i really nyoyed watchn all of it…..
And Marion is sounds like you are just an ahole with a computer.
Marion, it sounds like maybe you have DIFFERENT taste. just because you dont see the beauty in these pics, does not mean that everyone feels the same. I happen to think there are some amazing photos here. Why, if you did not feel they were any good, did you feel th need to post anything at all? And as far as talent goes, if anyone out there with “talent” is reading this, hopefully they dont feel the need to respond you. Why dont you get off your lazy, trolling ass and take some pictures yourself? Probably because you are the one with no “Talent.” Thank you, have a nice day.
Nova
It just a terrible or fearable pleces of world where there is no life or human beings. The World and UNESCO should keep these cities and town in memories and show it as a lapse decades herrites to other country of the world and find out the main reason of these incident or reason and why they were take place and how.
wow. just kinda stumbled upon this. didnt even know about any of these except for pripyat. thanks for the pics and the info. one day i’ll get out and see some of these places (with respect).
These photos are quite amazing. I find abandoned places to be thrilling and beautiful, and I choose to photograph them quite often. Please check out some of my work @ http://dawnheumann.com/one.html if you would like to see some Norther California abandoned beauty.
Dawn, those photos are freaking awesome! You did a great job.
Awesome information. It was a great help to our research we are doing in order to help save and restore the Youngstown Sheet and Tube Company Homes. Three years ago we came to what was soon going to be one of these places and now it is most likely going to be a revived vibrant community again. Kudo’s to you for all the time and effort this had to take.
What the heck?????
i’m sad,, i couldn’t visit this places ever
but the photos are simply awsome!!
loved it
Keep up
Wish to visit abandoned city in ukraine
What I don’t get is why people want to tour abandoned cities that have been left to the elements. I understand that whatever makes money, makes money, but if I was looking for places to visit on vacation, a town with a fire burning underground that will keep burning well into the next few centuries or a city that has been abandoned due to radioactive disasters, no matter how long ago, in a power plant only a few miles away would NOT be on my list, you know?
Well, some people like to park their asses on the beach three weeks, others go hiking on deserted mountains. I just returned from visiting Pripyat and it was the single best experience I had in years. The sensation of walking around in an area with such history, trying to capture the essence in pictures… I would not have missed it for the world.
Although my previous comment may seem a bit negative, the pictures are beautiful.
I felt something inside me when I saw these pics. They look like they must be horrific. But they are taken in nice angles though. I hope to see the other way around!
It’s like there can be no future if you would live on those places!!!
Found this site while searching for the Duga-3 in Ukraine. Got interested in old abandoned things a few years ago when I got some email on abandoned antenna sites. Should have gotten more interested and sooner when an old theater building was being demolished (what a waste) and when I could readily get to Centrailia, PA. Been there many times and somewhere in my photgraphic archives are many photos from at least 20 years ago along with many coal region abandoned places. I have to find them and scan them since there are so many websites now where they may be of use to others. Keep up the good work on this site. It’s great.
This is very intersting ..
thank you so much . I really enjoy History and discover old places .
Stunning places there sure is something about abandoned places.
Been looking at this guys flickr 4 some time, he gets around
http://www.flickr.com/photos/lusker_41/sets/
James
love to do ghost hunts on this kind of places…great pictures…
It was interesting to see these pictures..
Informative good article, thank for the great sharing!
Thanks for sharing! It’s a pity that it’s short:)
wooww.. so excited.. imwondering to go to that place… makesnme wanna know how that place to be builded…
http://argaworld.blogspot.com/
Amazing collection of abandoned towns and cities. The pictures are truly stunning. I was so intrigued by Centralia, PA that I googled it and came up with this great documentary on Hulu called “The Town that Was”. Here’s the link in case anyone is interested http://www.hulu.com/watch/157861/the-town-that-was
You have some pretty freighting images!
deanna
grt job….
Haunting photos. Really emotional.
This photographer has many abandoned places including Gunkanjima, Pripyat and places in Africa
http://smithjan.com/blog/2011/02/02/chernobyl-25-years-revisited-wanderings-in-pripyat/
I was happy to discover this particular web-site.I wanted to thank you for your effort with this wonderful study!! I definitely having fun with any little bit of it all and I’ve got you book-marked to see brand-new things you blog post.
Here is a link to see many more pictures of these places (Gunkanjima and Pripyat) as well as other places like Kolmanskop.
http://www.smithjan.com/portfolio.html
…first Salient Hill…after Centralia…True or lie…see you there …
Very nice article.
You are missing Consonno, in Italy. It’s the most famous Ghost City in north-Italy.
I found this website and it has very nice shoots.
I also love abandoned places and this is my website
http://aliciariusphotography.com
I hope you enjoy it!
ennjoyed this site very much I ahave started a project to photograph abandon farm steads in the state of Kansas
what is your website? i love abandoned farmsteads! i want to see!
This introucdes a pleasingly rational point of view.
An enchanting tour until you read the remarks and find that some viewers get viciously mean and hateful to those who didn’t enjoy it as much. Shame on you.
Sincerely,
Winter.
I think that these pictures are amazing. It ticks me off to read the negative comments too. But its okay for “those who dont enjoy it as much” to say horrible things about the blog author? Why is one right, but not the other? Shame on you for not talking about them.
Like a souless man, the walled Kowloon city is neglected.
Abandon is a bad word; it leaves one feeling forsaken.
These open our eyes to desolation, dejection, dread
Lots more of such sites abound and millions of people likewise, abandoned
by people or abandoned Jesus.
Those in hell would give anything to be in these abandoned sites.
Merci !
Its like you read my mind! You appear to know so much about this, like you wrote the book in it or something. I think that you could do with some pics to drive the message home a bit, but instead of that, this is great blog. An excellent read. I’ll certainly be back.
Lots of cool places.
why not mention the old changi hospital in singapore?
Turkey also has some abandoned places such as the Greek village of Kayaköy near Fethiye in Southwestern Turkey caused by a population exchange agreement made between Greece and Turkey in 1923.
What an interesting list! I want to visit Centralia, seems spooky and awesome! I don’t think I’d go there at night though…
-Antonia
You don’t have to go to exotic places in other countries to shoot abandoned and dying towns. I’ve been photographing Cairo, Illinois, since the middle ’60s. Every time I go through the town, another block of the downtown has been leveled.
Here are some pages I’ve done over the years:
Is Cairo worth saving?
http://www.capecentralhigh.com/cape-photos/is-cairo-worth-saving/
Forty-three years of Cairo photos (with additional links)
http://www.capecentralhigh.com/cape-photos/43-years-of-cairo-photographs/
Video crew visits Cairo
http://www.capecentralhigh.com/cape-photos/video-crew-in-cairo/
I visited this abandoned open-air pool not so long ago & made a short video of it… check it out!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&feature=endscreen&v=Qy38lTQvJ4s
POMY COLLINGWOOD
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