I've got two more 'proper' threads to post from my trip when I have time but here is a little compendium of most of what else I got up to during my brief opportunities to explore last month. Some of these were opportunistic, with only my camera and nothing else, some I had all my stuff for.
Oakland Dam Hydroelectric Plant
Oakland Dam Hydroelectric Plant is located on the Susquehanna River in Pennsylvania between the towns of Oakland on the northern side and Susquehanna on the southern side. My best friend grew up in Susquehanna so we took a little tour down there one day to see where she grew up, and I went back a few days later for this little explore. It was built in 1920 with an original output of a meagre 600kW, and in 1970 was closed by it's original operator. In 1985 the power plant was refurbished with a trio of 0.5MW hydro turbines, and it ran until the early 2000s when the dam across the Susquehanna river failed and the central portion collapsed into the river.
This year there were proposals put forward to demolish the remaining parts of the dam, as it has been left exactly as it was since the collapse with pieces of broken concrete and rebar sticking out of the middle of the river creating hazards for river traffic, but as of yet nothing has been done.
There isn't really much to see here, the main body of the building is an empty industrial structure - I imagine there are more goodies buried deep inside it though, but all ways to get to where they might be short of wading through the river seemed impossible at least in the height of summer. The massive floods the area experienced in 2006 certainly didn't help with the buildup of silt and mud around the inlets.
The failed dam and building viewed from the Susquehanna side of the river -
And from the Oakland side -
Roadside Mechanic's Shop
A small place I stumbled across on a roadtrip through upstate NY, I had originally been looking at the derelict hotel opposite (inaccessible) and didn't even clock this until sometime afterwards. Whilst the building wasn't accessible, the outside made for some nice photos.
Abandoned Inn/Hotel
Another roadside find a short distance from the mechanic's shop. I couldn't resist poking my nose inside the wide open door, it was a former inn/hotel which closed around five or so years ago looking at street view imagery, nothing much else to say really other than I didn't even try and go up the lopsided stairs after seeing how bowed and sunk many of the wooden floors were! There was a 1950s-era small hotel section to the left of the building but it was just bare single rooms.
School of Catholic Charity
This school has a very unusual and unexpected history. It's difficult to find any solid history on it's very early days but looking at the style it was built in the early part of the 1900s. In the 1970s demolition workers in a nearby brewery ruptured an ammonia pipeline and the fumes flooded into the school sending dozens of the children to hospital, although luckily none were seriously injured or worse. The school closed for good I would say maybe two decades ago but again finding solid dates is very difficult. After closure, however, the school was converted into a Catholic-run mental health treatment clinic, which sadly involved them completely bastardising the interior through the additions of many partition walls. Luckily, the auditorium was sealed off from the clinic and left to decay naturally, there are also a couple of very nice tin ceilings left in situ showing some of what it used to look like as a school. The one interesting addition left from it's time as a mental health clinic is the padded room, which is something I never expected to see in an old school.
The building looks set to be demolished in the imminent future as the entire block it's sitting on is undergoing major redevelopment, with the school's playground used as a storage area for building supplies and a parking area for contractors. It was unbelievably oppressively hot inside the building with almost nothing in the way of airflow, so we didn't stay too long inside as it became unbearable after a pretty short while.
National Bank of Spongebob aka Spongebob Squarebank
I honestly don't know a whole lot about this building. It was built around a century ago but went through many remodellings and renovations so a lot of the historical charm disappeared. It also passed through numerous different banking companies, until finally, in one final twist, it became a daycare centre after it ceased being used as a bank. This means there is the bizarre juxtaposition of a bank vault surrounded by painted murals depicting Disney and Nickelodeon characters, I guess removing a reinforced bank vault would be restrictively expensive for a daycare centre looking for a new home so it - and the smaller one which must have been for the ATM at one time - got left in place. The building has been completely cleared out and stripped other than the vault, which is sad but it did have the added bonus of uncovering the original plasterwork on the ceiling which was hidden for probably decades behind a suspended ceiling that is now piled up on one side of the building.
Thanks for looking
Oakland Dam Hydroelectric Plant
Oakland Dam Hydroelectric Plant is located on the Susquehanna River in Pennsylvania between the towns of Oakland on the northern side and Susquehanna on the southern side. My best friend grew up in Susquehanna so we took a little tour down there one day to see where she grew up, and I went back a few days later for this little explore. It was built in 1920 with an original output of a meagre 600kW, and in 1970 was closed by it's original operator. In 1985 the power plant was refurbished with a trio of 0.5MW hydro turbines, and it ran until the early 2000s when the dam across the Susquehanna river failed and the central portion collapsed into the river.
This year there were proposals put forward to demolish the remaining parts of the dam, as it has been left exactly as it was since the collapse with pieces of broken concrete and rebar sticking out of the middle of the river creating hazards for river traffic, but as of yet nothing has been done.
There isn't really much to see here, the main body of the building is an empty industrial structure - I imagine there are more goodies buried deep inside it though, but all ways to get to where they might be short of wading through the river seemed impossible at least in the height of summer. The massive floods the area experienced in 2006 certainly didn't help with the buildup of silt and mud around the inlets.
The failed dam and building viewed from the Susquehanna side of the river -
And from the Oakland side -
Roadside Mechanic's Shop
A small place I stumbled across on a roadtrip through upstate NY, I had originally been looking at the derelict hotel opposite (inaccessible) and didn't even clock this until sometime afterwards. Whilst the building wasn't accessible, the outside made for some nice photos.
Abandoned Inn/Hotel
Another roadside find a short distance from the mechanic's shop. I couldn't resist poking my nose inside the wide open door, it was a former inn/hotel which closed around five or so years ago looking at street view imagery, nothing much else to say really other than I didn't even try and go up the lopsided stairs after seeing how bowed and sunk many of the wooden floors were! There was a 1950s-era small hotel section to the left of the building but it was just bare single rooms.
School of Catholic Charity
This school has a very unusual and unexpected history. It's difficult to find any solid history on it's very early days but looking at the style it was built in the early part of the 1900s. In the 1970s demolition workers in a nearby brewery ruptured an ammonia pipeline and the fumes flooded into the school sending dozens of the children to hospital, although luckily none were seriously injured or worse. The school closed for good I would say maybe two decades ago but again finding solid dates is very difficult. After closure, however, the school was converted into a Catholic-run mental health treatment clinic, which sadly involved them completely bastardising the interior through the additions of many partition walls. Luckily, the auditorium was sealed off from the clinic and left to decay naturally, there are also a couple of very nice tin ceilings left in situ showing some of what it used to look like as a school. The one interesting addition left from it's time as a mental health clinic is the padded room, which is something I never expected to see in an old school.
The building looks set to be demolished in the imminent future as the entire block it's sitting on is undergoing major redevelopment, with the school's playground used as a storage area for building supplies and a parking area for contractors. It was unbelievably oppressively hot inside the building with almost nothing in the way of airflow, so we didn't stay too long inside as it became unbearable after a pretty short while.
National Bank of Spongebob aka Spongebob Squarebank
I honestly don't know a whole lot about this building. It was built around a century ago but went through many remodellings and renovations so a lot of the historical charm disappeared. It also passed through numerous different banking companies, until finally, in one final twist, it became a daycare centre after it ceased being used as a bank. This means there is the bizarre juxtaposition of a bank vault surrounded by painted murals depicting Disney and Nickelodeon characters, I guess removing a reinforced bank vault would be restrictively expensive for a daycare centre looking for a new home so it - and the smaller one which must have been for the ATM at one time - got left in place. The building has been completely cleared out and stripped other than the vault, which is sad but it did have the added bonus of uncovering the original plasterwork on the ceiling which was hidden for probably decades behind a suspended ceiling that is now piled up on one side of the building.
Thanks for looking
