What happens to “abandoned places” buildings or theme parks after people stop using them and maintaining them? When a structure becomes abandoned, nature takes over, and most often, it becomes whatever the wild around it decides it to be.
The list below of 42 abandoned places around the world shows what happens when nature takes over.
01. A Tree Growing Through An Abandoned Piano
02. Overgrown Palace, Poland
In 1910, this grand palace was built as a home for Polish Royalty. The rest of the century proved uncertain for the country. Under communist rule, the castle became an agricultural school home for mentally disabled adults and children. The former palace was deserted following the fall of the USSR.
03. Jet Star Rollercoaster, Seaside Heights, New Jersey
The Jet Star Rollercoaster was left submerged in the Atlantic Ocean after Superstorm Sandy in 2013. It stood rusting for six months until it was plucked from the sea.
04. Abandoned House In The Woods
05. Church In St. Etienne, France
06. An Abandoned Church With A Few Lingering Parishioners, Netherlands
07. Doll Factory, Spain
08. Tree Growing Around An Abandoned Bicycle
09. Shipwrecks In A Sandbar, Bermuda Triangle
10. Floating Forest, Sydney, Australia
11. Movie Theater In Detroit, Michigan
With Detroit’s decline, many of its historic buildings have fallen into disuse. This movie theater is both a fascinating and sad example.
12. Mare Island Naval Shipyard, Vallejo, California
The Mare Island Naval Shipyard acted as a submarine port during both the World Wars. In the 1990s, the building was abandoned, and flooding created a fantastic mirror effect.
13. Victorian-Style Tree House, Florida, USA
14. Forgotten Bugatti’s – Abandoned Places
15. The Titanic Wreck
The titanic took its first and last voyage in April 1912. It was not until 73 years later that the decaying wreck of what was once the grandest ship in the world was discovered. The 1,500 souls lost with the vessel had been devoured by sea life, leaving behind a ghost ship.
16. Chemin De Fer De Petite Ceinture, France
The “little belt railway” was a circular railway built in 1852 to supply Paris’ fortifications. When the city outgrew its defenses in 1934, the railway system was also left to run wild.
17. Spreepark, Berlin, Germany
Spreepark opened in 1969 and was the only amusement park in East Berlin during Soviet rule. When the wall fell, bigger and better parks opened, leading to Spreeparks’ closure in 2001.
18. Library, Russia – Abandoned Places
19. Island Home, Finland
20. Chris McCandless’ Magic Bus, Stampede Trail, Alaska
Bus 142 was left behind by the workers who built the railway at Stampede Trail. Christopher McCandless, an American hitchhiker whose story was told through the movie “Into The Wild, lived and died in what he called the “magic bus” during the summer of 1992.
21. Turquoise Canal, Venice, Italy.
Like any other city, areas of Venice are boarded up and abandoned.
22. Staircase To Nowhere, Pismo Beach, California
Once giving access to the beach, the walkway that connected this staircase to the bluffs has long since rotted away.
23. Nara Dreamland, Japan
Nara Dreamland was built in 1961 after Disneyland took the world by storm. The entrance to the park was almost identical to Disneyland and included its version of Sleeping Beauty’s Castle. The park closed in 2006 because of low visitor numbers.
24. Abandoned Mining Track, Taiwan
25. Abandoned Jetty
26. Bare Footprints In An Abandoned Nuclear Reactor
27. An Abandoned Waterpark
28. Boathouse, Obersee Lake, Germany
29. Abandoned Hallway
30. Methodist Church, Gary, Indiana
Gary, Indiana, was founded in 1905 during the boom of US steel. During the 1950s, more than 200,000 people worked in the bustling city. As the
31. Church In The Snow, Canada
32. Blue Spiral Staircase In A European Castle
33. Soviet Naval Testing Station In Makhachkala, Russia
34. Church Steeple Peeking Out Of A Frozen Lake, Reschen, Italy
Lake Reschen is an artificial reservoir that submerged several villages and a 14th-century church.
35. Glenwood Power Station, New York
The Glenwood Power Station, built in 1906, has long been obsolete. After closing in 1968, the sight was used as a backdrop for creepy thrillers and zombie movies.
36. Flooded Mall
37. Abandoned Theater – Abandoned Places
38. Car Graveyard, Ardennes, Belgium
Many American soldiers on the Western Front during World War 2 purchased cars for personal use. When the war ended, they proved too expensive to ship home, and many were abandoned in this eerie graveyard.
39. Driverless Bumper Cars, Chernobyl, Ukraine
The city of Chernobyl was abandoned after the nearby nuclear disaster in 1986. Due to radiation, it has been left untouched ever since the incident and will be for many thousands of years into the future. Nature now rules the city in what resembles an apocalyptic movie.
40. Abandoned Sanatorium, Berlin, Germany
41. Abandoned House In Virginia
42. Poveglia Island, Italy – Abandoned Places
Poveglia is an island in the Venetian Lagoon that, under the rule of Napoleon Bonaparte, became a dumping ground for plague victims and later an asylum for the mentally ill.
See part 1 of the series “abandoned places” here.
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