Hi again! With the weather warming up I've been getting antsy to get out and explore. Still have not found a great spot in the UK, but figured I'd post another favorite from back home. This one has some remaining items, but is certainly not an untouched gem. However, I found it very photogenic, and was just a fun place to explore and take some pictures!
HISTORY: (Un?)luckily this is a superfund site, the term for an environmentally contaminated area in the US. While not great for the wildlife, it does mean I can copy and paste from the EPA report. "This 553-acre industrial complex is located near where Billerica borders the neighboring town of Tewksbury. It includes manufacturing, railyard maintenance, and storage facilities as well as wetlands. Middlesex Canal, a 27- mile waterway that dates to the 1800s, extends across the site. Residential areas and wetlands surround the area. Industrial activities at the site, including manufacturing and railyard maintenance, began in the early 1900s. Boston and Maine Railroad first purchased the land in 1911, and sold or leased parcels and buildings to companies over time. The company operated an oil and sludge recycling area on part of the property in the late 1930s. Firms operating on site disposed of industrial and sanitary wastewater as well as stormwater in lagoons on site. Periodically, they dredged these lagoons and placed the dredged material in adjacent stockpiles."
REPORT: The exploration site is specifically the train maintenance facility. It is located in an active industrial park, but is completely open and accessible from the road with no signage. Workers at adjacent buildings waved in a friendly way, clearly used to explorers. The building itself is mostly cavernous, with a beautiful blend of industrial steel and plants taking over.
Additionally, there are some areas with industrial equipment left behind.
Some train parts, such as these gauges, were also laying around.
A documents library was still stocked. Although weather damage has ruined most of the paperwork, some items remained, like an ancient repair manual.
One unusual thing that stood out was a giant quantity of MBTA transit tickets. This location is not particularly central to Boston, and has very limited MBTA service. These rapid transit cards would not be usable for getting to this site, and are not particularly old; $1.25 tickets were introduced in 2004, after this site was decommissioned. It's unclear to me why they were all over the place.
HISTORY: (Un?)luckily this is a superfund site, the term for an environmentally contaminated area in the US. While not great for the wildlife, it does mean I can copy and paste from the EPA report. "This 553-acre industrial complex is located near where Billerica borders the neighboring town of Tewksbury. It includes manufacturing, railyard maintenance, and storage facilities as well as wetlands. Middlesex Canal, a 27- mile waterway that dates to the 1800s, extends across the site. Residential areas and wetlands surround the area. Industrial activities at the site, including manufacturing and railyard maintenance, began in the early 1900s. Boston and Maine Railroad first purchased the land in 1911, and sold or leased parcels and buildings to companies over time. The company operated an oil and sludge recycling area on part of the property in the late 1930s. Firms operating on site disposed of industrial and sanitary wastewater as well as stormwater in lagoons on site. Periodically, they dredged these lagoons and placed the dredged material in adjacent stockpiles."
REPORT: The exploration site is specifically the train maintenance facility. It is located in an active industrial park, but is completely open and accessible from the road with no signage. Workers at adjacent buildings waved in a friendly way, clearly used to explorers. The building itself is mostly cavernous, with a beautiful blend of industrial steel and plants taking over.
Additionally, there are some areas with industrial equipment left behind.
Some train parts, such as these gauges, were also laying around.
A documents library was still stocked. Although weather damage has ruined most of the paperwork, some items remained, like an ancient repair manual.
One unusual thing that stood out was a giant quantity of MBTA transit tickets. This location is not particularly central to Boston, and has very limited MBTA service. These rapid transit cards would not be usable for getting to this site, and are not particularly old; $1.25 tickets were introduced in 2004, after this site was decommissioned. It's unclear to me why they were all over the place.
