Image by Kaplansa

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It may not look like much today but this peeling Art Deco facade was – as the name suggests – once the grand entrance to the Crystal Pool at Glen Echo Park, a long-gone attraction in what is a now a slightly spooky incarnation of its former self.  While still very much in existence, there’s a sense that Glen Echo Park, near Washington D.C., is not quite what it once was, and that time and technology have long since passed it by.

Images by trialsanderrors (top) and Mo Kaiwen

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This might sound perverse, but the park is even more spooky because it’s still very much alive.  The paths weaving around the attractions are busy with visitors, but the attractions themselves seem eerily quiet.  Most of the rides have now gone, including an early rollercoaster (above), shooting gallery (which closed during World War Two due to ammo shortages), and bumper cars.  The former Bumper Car Pavilion was reinvented for contra, swing and salsa dancing.

Images by luckywhitegirl and Alex Barth (bottom right)

(Images 1-5 and 6 licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic)

Officially closing as an amusement park in 1968, Glen Echo is now home to an arts education programme, while screams and laughter from the rollercoaster have given way to the annual Washington Folk Festival.  An antique carousel still occupies the site, while a historic streetcar stands at the park’s grand entrance, a memorial to the days when the Washington and Great Falls Electric Railroad transported eager revellers here from nearby Georgetown.

Images by Link576 (top) and IntangibleArts (bottom), inset via Library of Congress

(Images top and bottom licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic.  Inset: public domain)

While the historic carousel is the star of the show, the less fortunate Crystal Pool, now filled-in and grass-covered, is a draw for photographers looking to capture the mysterious atmosphere surrounding urban decay.  Its peeling facade gives Glen Echo the feeling of a living ghost park, while reminding us what “amusement” was about before the days of video games and social networks.  As a relic of the early 20th century, the Crystal Pool is similar in style to the good old lidos featured in this article about abandoned swimming pools.

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Abandoned streetcars are an unusual sight in a redeveloping area of Brooklyn, New York City.  Usually the clutter of the land’s previous life would be cleared to make way for modern renewal.  But in the reviving waterfront district of Red Hook, the rusting wrecks are as much a part of the streetscene as the converted warehouses looming over them.

The streetcars probably owe their continued survival to the slow regeneration of industrial Red Hook.  Now the domain of artists, organic grocery stores and waterfront restaurants, this strangely quiet corner of Brooklyn is still cut-off from more lively parts of town.

The stripped-out streetcars are an odd sight to behold outside a modern waterfront cafe.  Tables and chairs are dotted around their dilapidated shells, which continue to serve a purpose by providing shade to customers.  People wander around them, taking photos and peering through their broken windows.

Taking in the scene, it’s clear the streetcars are stitched into the fabric of the local area, to the point that the atmosphere of the restaurant would not be the same without them.  In an odd way they almost look like pieces of urban art, memorials to the Brooklyn City Street Car Company that once operated them – and may one day run them along the waterfront again.

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British author Mary Shelley has become the latest historical figure to be commemorated by Google Doodles, the Telegraph reports. On what would have been her 213th birthday, the author who brought us the classic horror tale Frankenstein received her own spooky doodle in place of the search engine’s traditional logo.

Images via Google.co.uk & Google.com

In true Gothic horror fashion, the image shows a dim room with several ghostly portraits hanging from the walls, while the shadow of a figure with arms outstretched looms from a passageway.  You can almost hear the zombie-like groaning sound that often seems to accompany such phenomena.

Images via Google

Hovering the mouse over the logo displays the words “Mary Shelley’s 213th birthday”, while clicking the image links to a search page for “Mary Shelley”.  Born in 1797, Shelly began writing Frankenstein at the age of 18.  The novel, while Gothic in style and influenced by the Romantic movement, is also considered one of the earliest works of science fiction.

Images by Theodore Von Holst (left) and Punch Magazine

(Images left and right in public domain)

The title character, scientist Victor Frankenstein, creates a terrifying monster in the likeness of man, albeit a big one, and all hell is let loose from there.  The story has generated numerous interpretations over the years, including the mistaken attribution of the name “Frankenstein” to the monster, and the 80s song China in Your Hand by T’Pau. Frankenstein’s monster even appeared in Victorian-era anti-Irish propaganda (above right).

Images by Richard Rothwell (left) and Amelia Curran. Inset by Reginald Easton, allegedly drawn from Mary Shelley's death mask.

(Images 1, 2, 3 in public domain)

Dark themes explored within Shelley’s work have been attributed in part to ongoing tragedy during her own life.  Her husband, the Romantic poet Percy Bysshe Shelley, drowned at sea.  Three of the couple’s children never saw adolescence, and Shelley finally died after a decade of poor health at the age of 53.

Google Doodles – the search engine’s signature homepage images – change regularly to reflect major events.  Birthdays of authors JM Barrie and Hans Christian Anderson have also been celebrated, as have the Apollo 11 lunar landing and The Wizard of Oz.  The first Google Doodle depicted the Burning Man Festival of 1998, while last year UFOs and crop circles commemorated the birthday of science fiction genius H.G. Wells.

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Images by English Russia, Vikimach and Alsandro

Eurasia is often considered a “supercontinent” comprising all of Europe and most of Asia, but in wonky geopolitical speak it refers primarily to the post-Soviet states, the Central Asian republics, and the Transcaucasian republics.  Taking that as a point of departure, it’s no wonder that Eurasia has its fair share of ghost towns and abandoned cities, straddling a landmass intrinsically tied to the collapse of the Soviet Union.  Many settlements have been left abandoned in the wake of industrial decline and ethnic disputes, while others linger on, all but forgotten in the margins of existance.

Agdam, Azerbaijan

Image by Joaoleitao

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In July 1993 fierce fighting brought the town of Agdam in Azerbaijan to its knees. Troops of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic raided the town, forcing its entire population to flee. When fighting ceased, the raiders set about destroying Agdam to prevent its recapture, reducing it to a crumbling ghost town.

Images (left) by Post of Azerbaijan and (right) by Jalpeyrie

(Left image in public domain, right licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported )

After the Russian Empire fell in 1918, the largely Armenian-populated region of Nagorno-Karabakh became a bone of contention between Armenia and Azerbaijan. Nagorno-Karabakh became part of the Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic in 1923, but when the Soviet Union collapsed the region once again became a sore point, escalating a fierce ethnic conflict in the Nagorno-Karabakh War of 1991 to 1994.  The town’s mosque (seen in the postage stamp above) lingers on deserted amid the ruins.

Tkvarcheli, Abkhazia

Images by Alsandro (top) and Alaexis (bottom and inset)

(Top image in public domain; 2, 3, 4 licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.5 & 3.0)

Tkvarcheli is a coal mining town in Abkhazia, another disputed territory within the south-western flank of the Caucusas. Tkvarcheli became a town in 1942 and was temporarily lost to the Germans during World War Two. Following the end of Soviet rule, Georgia claimed Abkhazia, which is recognised as an independent territory by Russia, fueling tensions in the region.

Lashkendar Christian temple near Tkvarcheli (images by Alaexis)

(Images left & right licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported)

Georgia besieged Tkvarcheli during the War in Abkhazia (1992-3), although the town witheld through Russian aid. When Soviet mines closed, bkhaz-Turkish company Tamsaş took over the coal fields – considered illegal by Georgia and leading to the seizure of company vessels. Tensions led to a sharp population decline. While a few people remain in Tkvarcheli, the settlement is little more than a ghost town.

Ochamchira, Abkhazia

Sacred tree (top) in Elyr-Nykha shrine, Ochamchira (images by Alaexis)

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Like Tkvarcheli, the coastal city of Ochamchira on the shores of the Black Sea also witnessed drastic population decline after the War in Abkhazia. Once a small maritime settlement that witnessed fighting between Russian and Turkish-Abkhaz forces in 1877, the population had grown to 18,700 by 1978. But ethnic cleansing of Georgians in 1992-93 left Ochamchira in the grip of abandonment. While some people remain, most of those affected by the conflict have never returned. It has been suggested that Russia’s Black Sea Fleet may eventually be relocated here from Sevastopol.

Varosha, Famagusta, Cyprus

Images by www.video99.co.uk (top) and Brian Harrington Spier

(Top image in public domain; bottom licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic)

Varosha was once a booming tourist district in the city of Famagusta. But inhabitants and vacationers fled during the 1974 Turkish invasion of Cyprus, leaving Varosha abandoned and off-limits. The main roads through the district, JFK Boulevard and Leonidas, were home to smart hotels, shopping, bars and restaurants. Places like the Argo Hotel on JFK Boulevard, once a glamourous haunt of celebrities like Dame Elizabeth Taylor, now lie silent and abandoned.

Image by Vikimach

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Nobody has been granted access since the invasion, and the buildings are slowly falling apart. Nature takes on corroding metal and crumbling masonry in a relentless battle to reclaim Varosha. It’s an eerie, time-warped sight today, as plants work their roots into walls and pavements, and brand new – now vintage – 1974 cars rust outside motor dealerships. Some even say lights are regularly seen in the broken windows of the abandoned buildings.  Read more about Varosha in Michael J. Totten’s Middle East Journal.

Oil Rocks, Azerbaijan

Images via English Russia

(English Russia)

About 30 miles off the coast of Azerbaijan is the semi-abandoned oil drilling platform of Neft Daşları, known as Oil Rocks. This incredible floating city in the middle of the Caspian Sea was built to support a 5,000-strong population and 200km of road, built on top of dirt and landfill. Referred to as “The Island of Seven Ships”, due to a number of vessels sunk during its construction to provide a solid base for causeways, Oil Rocks boasts a school, shops and library. BLDG Blog writes that “this metropolis of platforms would not be out of place in a design studio themed around micronations, the future of private urbanism, or even failed utopias”.

Kadykchan, Russia

Images via English Russia

(English Russia)

Built by Gulag prisoners during World War Two, Kadykchan was another ill-fated coal mining community in the Susumansky District of Magadan Oblast, Russia. Kadykchan’s mines supplied coal to a local electric power station, but again the industry suffered after the collapse of the Soviet Union. An explosion at killed six miners in 1996 and the decision was taken to close the mines forever. The population of Kadykchan (5,794 in 1989) had dwindled to less than 300 by 2007, a sure sign that this old mining community is set to join the expanding list of ghost towns in Eurasia.

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Image by Kevin Cole

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In 2004 long time business owner Kevin Cole retired to the small fishing town of Morro Bay, California, to enjoy his childhood passion for photography.  Since going digital, Kevin has used professional Canon equipment to create a dazzling collection of images, covering everything from wildlife and the great outdoors to people, structures and everyday events.  These beautifully rendered pictures are just a tiny taster of Kevin’s work.

Image by Kevin Cole

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Little more than two concrete walls rising out of the dirt, the structure above was a gas station and restaurant at Cadiz Summit.  Tourist cabins once stood alongside for drivers travelling along Route 66.  These have long gone now, and the walls have become a blank canvas for graffiti artists.  John Flannagan’s grandfather, James, used to own the place, and John is busy compiling nostalgic reference for anyone who may have experienced Cadiz Summit.  (Top image shows the old gas station in the living ghost town of Chloride, Arizona’s oldest mining town.)

Image by Kevin Cole

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Kevin has photographed numerous historic buildings across California and beyond.  The Santa Barbara County Courthouse was completed in 1929 and is still in use today. The image above shows the Mural Room on the second floor of the historic courthouse.  HDR processing adds an extra sparkle.

Image by Kevin Cole

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The historic La Posada de Albuquerque Hotel (above & below) has been transformed into the pre-eminent boutique hotel after a $30 million renovation and is now named Hotel Andaluz.  While the building more than speaks for itself, Kevin’s processing once again enhances the forms and draws out the various colours in all their vividness.

Image by Kevin Cole

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Kevin welcomes positive feedback as well as constructive criticism, and aims to create a vibrant network of Flickr contacts who enjoy his pictures and vice versa.  His advise to fellow photographers is: “Don’t forget to take that picture of what you don’t see.”

Image by Kevin Cole

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Kevin captured this brightly lit Art Deco building in his home town of Morro Bay.  It almost has the look of an old cinema/movie theatre, but is probably a good old fashioned diner.  Love Art Deco?  You’ll find more in our Visual Exploration of Long Lost Cinemas.

Image by Kevin Cole

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This picture of the old 41 Cafe illustrates perfectly how a rundown and seemingly uninspired building can be brought to life through the wonders of digital photography.  Click here and scroll down to see a picture of Kevin setting up this shot.  A white pickup truck in the background has been edited out to give the abandoned cafe a more solitary feel.

Image by Kevin Cole

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The Palace of Fine Arts in San Francisco is a monumental – literally – structure that cannot fail to impress and entrall.  Built in 1915 for the Panama-Pacific Exposition (the first World’s Fair), the grand structure is currently undergoing restoration work.  This photo, dominated by the massive rotunda, was captured at sunrise.  Don’t miss our full article about the Palace of Fine Arts.

Image by Kevin Cole

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There’s something oddly romantic about neglected boats lying near the sea.  Perhaps it’s because they spur the imagination (in some of us, at least) into dreaming of travel on the high seas, or maybe it’s nothing more than the idea that they’re no longer needed in the modern age.  Wherever this particular location is, it bears a striking resemblance to the old boat yard at Low Newton by the Sea, when looking toward the beach… To see more of Kevin Cole’s work, visit his Flickr set and check out his personal website.

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Images via U.S. Navy, Google Earth and Virtual Globetrotting

(Images top and left)

Previously in our popular article Top Secret Aircraft That Officially Do Not Exist, we featured the somewhat retro-futuristic looking A-12 Avenger II, designed as a stealth attack aircraft for the U.S. Navy.  The programme was scrapped before the first prototype had been developed, although two full scale mock-ups were reportedly built.  But what became of them, we asked ourselves?  The triangular craft clearly hadn’t found their way to a museum…  Were they still classified?  These questions have since been answered by those beady eyed online explorers over at Virtual Globetrotting, who located one of the mockups in a junk-filled corner of a Fort Worth air force base.

Images via Virtual Globetrotting and Google Earth

Satellite imagery shows the A-12 Avenger II full scale mock-up (FSM) lying on its belly with its folding wings removed.  Nearby is what appears to be an F-35 Joint Strike Fighter mock-up, seemingly forgotten about in this remote corner of Carswell Air Force Base (aka NAS Station Joint Reserve Base Forth Worth), where F-35 final assembly is located.  In the more recent 2009 image (bottom), two F-16s have joined the condemned line-up, while the A-12 appears to be tucked away under a protective cover.  According to one commentator on this forum, the FSM was destined for a Texas museum but wound up outside when the deal feel through, as Lockheed couldn’t justify the hangar space to protect it from the elements.

Images by U.S. Navy

(Images top and bottom in public domain)

The A-12 Avenger II was envisioned by McDonnell Douglas and General Dynamics as an all-weather, carrier-based stealth bomber for the U.S. Navy and Marines.  Shrowded in secrecy, the A-12 FSM shows a triangular flying wing design with a cockpit near the apex.  Development of the A-12 was cancelled in January 1991 by then-Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney when the estimated price per plane hit $165 million.

Virtual Globetrotting have cleared up the mystery of one of the prototypes, but where is the second one?  For more information about the A-12 Avenger and similar classified programmes, check out Top Secret Aircraft That Officially Do Not Exist.

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Image via NASA

(Image in public domain)

The Interplanetary Transport Network (ITN) sounds like the stuff of science fiction writers like H.G. Wells or even George Lucas, but it is actually real, and has already been used.  Simply put, the ITN is a collection of pathways through the solar system, governed by gravity and predicted by chaos theory, that require little energy for an object to traverse them.  It has been likened to a celestial superhighway winding around the sun, planets and moons that could slash the amount of fuel needed by spacecraft to explore the solar system.

Image via NASA

(Image in public domain)

Douglas L. Smith, editor of Engineering and Science Magazine at Caltech, points out that the ITN is more akin to scenic routes like the Pacific Coast Highway than the interstates (motorways) – not the fastest, most direct routes between Point A and Point B, but a more winding, leisurely path.  Dr Smith simplifies it by saying: “The quickest paths in outer space are all toll roads (it costs a lot of rocket fuel to use them), while you can ride the Interplanetary Superhighway almost for free. Gravity does the driving, so the system is really more like an elaborate set of Hot Wheels tracks. all you have to do is let go of the car at the right place.”

Image by NASA, retouched by Xander89

(Original in public domain.  Retouched image licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported)

The ITN uses the gravitational pull between celestial bodies. In many cases, the competing forces cancel each other out, leaving positions called “Lagrange points“, essentially balancing points, where a small object can be stationary relative to two larger objects, such as the Earth and Moon.  A set of five Lagrange points (above), also called liberation points, exist between every pair of massive bodies.  They are peculiar in that they allow objects to orbit around them, despite the absence of any material object (like a planet) within.  They can then redirect trajectories through space (low energy transfers), creating corridors for ships to travel using little or no fuel.

Images by NASA

(Images (clockwise from top left) 1, 2, 3 in public domain)

In 1978 the International Sun/Earth Explorer 3 (ISEE-3) spacecraft became the first to orbit one of Earth’s Lagrange points (L1).  Taking advantage of the unique gravity environment, it proved that suspension between two gravitational fields was possible using little fuel.  Mission accomplished, it was then redirected through the geomagnetic tail of a comet and subsequently renamed the International Cometary Explorer (ICE).

Image via Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope Corporation

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NASA’s recent Genesis mission also made use of a low energy transfer via the ITN.  Orbiting the Sun-Earth L1 point for over two years while collecting samples of the solar wind, the craft was redirected to the L2 Lagrange point before finally being sling-shot back to Earth.  SMART-1 of the European Space Agency was the most recent craft to use a low energy transfer, on this epic twisting journey along the Interplanetary Transport Network.  SMART-1 impacted the lunar surface as planned on September 3, 2006, bringing its mission to an end (above).

Image by Dcoetzee

(Image in public domain)

As we fast approach our one year anniversary, it’s fair to say that up until now, Urban Ghosts Media has been firmly entrenched within the Earth’s atmosphere.  And that’s how it will stay for the most part.  But now that we’ve broken through the boundaries of terrestrial existence, we too might find occasion to explore the final frontier!

For a better understanding of the Interplanetary Transport Network, read the full article by Douglas L. Smith of Caltech.

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Carmel Street, Belfast (image by Albert Bridge)

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Belfast is famous for many reasons, not least its murals brought about by The Troubles that gripped Northern Ireland from the late 1960s until the “Good Friday” Agreement of 1998. But less well known is an intriguing network of streets in the inner-south of Belfast known as the Holy Land.

Holy Land mural (image by missfitzphotos)

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The Holy Land (or Holyland) is a Victorian residential area behind Queen’s University, skirted to the south by the River Lagan, and bounded by University Street, the Ormeau Road and the Botanic Gardens. The area takes its unexpected name from the streets within its boundaries: Jerusalem Street, Palestine Street, Damascus Street, Carmel Street and Cairo Street.

Image via Google Earth

These streets were built in the 1890s by Brown McConnell Clark, Belfast’s oldest property consultants. Sir Robert McConnell, former Lord Mayor of Belfast and a devout Christian travelled to Palestine and Egypt with builder friend James Rea, on a journey that would inspire the name and doubtless the ideals of their later development. The street names alone conjure a sense of mystery and the spirit of travel in faraway lands.

Clockwise from top left: Jerusalem Street, Palestine Street, Damascus Street, Carmel Street (images by Albert Bridge)

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But in a twist the founding fathers probably never imagined, the Holy Land’s demographics have shifted considerably over the years thanks to a burgeoning university population and rising house prices. What was once a working class Protestant community has given way to 90% student and young workers, with longterm resident numbers dwindling to just 250 people. Raucous student hijinks has led to an increase in anti-social behaviour, while poorly secured university housing has in turn left students vulnerable to crime.

Image by Speed Demon Photos

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Numerous campaigns have been spearheaded to try and stymie petty crime and calm the raucous roads, including one aimed at students positing the question: “Do You Turn Into A Monster After Dark?”  The Holylands Arts Festival (above, 2005) also sought to bring locals and students together and foster a sense of community.  But recent statistics revealed that crime is on the rise in the Holy Land. With many students moving to escape the unrest, landlords have struggled to re-let properties and house prices in the area have plummeted.

The relatively ornate Cairo Street (top, by Albert Bridge) and the relatively plain Jerusalem Street (by Ross)

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The number of sexual attacks is said to have increased, correlating with a purported scheme to house convicted sex offenders in this transient vicinity.  This, along with anti-social student antics and petty crimes committed by a minority of locals has led some commentators to conclude that there is nothing holy about the Holy Land.

Image by fa1th

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But that doesn’t mean we can’t celebrate the neighbourhood’s hard-working past, or the sense of mystery and adventure conjured by its enigmatic street names. Many former residents likely worked in the shipyards of East Belfast that built the most famous liner in history, Titanic, and their legacy will always live on despite modern upheavals. But for the time being, at least, it’s probably best to explore the Holy Land from the comfort and safety of your home computer.  While you’re doing that you might want to give the above question, painted on a gable end, some thought.  It’s an ironic sight indeed in an area whose name offers a nod to the Bible.

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