CARRIE furnace from the tracks
Our journey to the rustbelt of the USA was exclusively guided by the need for some old, huge rusty steel mills. Pittsburgh PA. is the Sheffield of the USA, and the surrounding counties around the city is littered with the remains of the once great US steel industry. Here, many of the HUGE blast furnaces, mills and processors sit rusting alongside the dwindling numbers of their still active brothers, fighting cheap competition from the far east.
We first tried to have a bash at the most famous of all the old blast furnaces, Carrie. After about an hour of hiding in the bushes, diving behind rocks to dodge the huge amount of traffic going into the site and almost being caught by a security guard at the gate we walked the tracks back to the top of the site to investigate further. The site was covered in vans, cherry pickers and trucks looking a bit like a film set, although it turned out Carrie is actually being turned into a Museum, and was packed full of staff doing her up. A good thing I guess, although you've not got much chance to have a peak now if you want to..
Activity..
CokeExpress
After sitting in the sun and playing about with some freight we headed back, and after some top-tip-off from a local superstar, we were on the tracks the next day heading towards an absolute gem.
Utterly massive and only just pulled off 'moth ball' status, I was in my element here. I didn't take too many photos as I spent more time running about the gantries and walkways and climbing the colossus of a blast furnace which nearly killed me on multiple occasions. It's totally fucked.
Even if you dont like massive old rusty factories, go to Pittsburgh. The people are lovely, they have good beer and the rooftops are sick.
Over and out..
