Industrial

Elevator Action

So I managed to get out exploring one more time before summer. Nate thought he could get us into some grain elevators in Buffalo that actually had stairs to the top so I could climb too. I guess he was sort of right; apparently the permission we got was only to walk around the outside, not to go in, so the trip ended early with us getting chased out by the owners. At least it was something... maybe enough to last me until September. I only ever knew of Pinkertons as something from history class, the union busting scabs. I…

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Concrete Central

I really need to cut down on the skip class and go exploring thing. Especially a week before finals. But if Nate offers to take me to Buffalo on some random Monday, do you really think I won't go? Of course Nate was all about climbing the thing, all he wanted was the view from the top. Like hell I'd climb a staircase with 34 of the first 35 steps missing... so I got to take pictures of the bottom for two hours while he had all the fun. Oh well... when life gives you columns, make -- colonnade? Columns.…

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Within A Mile Of Home

This is an absolutely rotten spot on the southwest side. I'd had my eyes on it for close to two years now as it sat near-abandoned, occupied by some clever squatters with Rube Goldberg booby-traps on the entrance. I never did get to figure out their story, but judging by the signs of life I'd seen, and the possessions left behind, it must have been a fascinating one. Last summer's occupant, who we came to call "Mr. October," made his presence very well known by keeping a boom box on the roof blasting baseball games seemingly every day. After a…

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Fluid Dynamics 201

After the furniture factory, a few of us split off from the UR group at Nate's suggestion to check out this place in Niagara Falls he found. Once the power plant for the massive (and demolished) Union Carbide plant, at the time Niagara's biggest employer, this was the largest Tesla AC (54 volt) facility ever constructed. Union Carbide eventually failed massively, in part due to bad public relations after the Bhopal incident, and most of the compound met its demise. This part still remains, surrounded by active machine shops, but completely open for the past few decades. Other than the…

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Furniture Factory

What we think is a furniture factory, on Sycamore street in Buffalo. I came here once in 2009, it's changed a bit since then, less building more nature. Things haven't been going as planned for a while so I figured I'd let anyone from my group go with the UR UrbEx club. The result was mostly weird: Nate and Amy, firmly rooted in the "other" school of urbex, came in with stealthy looks and respirator masks, and generally way out of place. It will be interesting having them around for the rest of the year... Nate sees something on the…

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The Worst Day Since Yesterday

What better way to escape from Laura than skipping a few classes and going exploring on a Monday? First location was back at Sykes Datatronics again, I'm hoping I got a different look at it this time around? After that, we returned to the ever more interesting Iola Sanitarium, for building #7 this time I suspect these were some sort of holding cells. Building #7 found use after Iola closed as an office for the county department of Corrections. At the end of this basement was a cinderblocked-off doorway. Ever the curious (and frustrated) one, I threw a poorly aimed…

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