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Helsinki, Finland
Re: Tour De Finland 2020
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
Today's location is a former leather factory located next to a railroad. I had been travelling past it numerous times thinking, that I'll get there some day.

My background research has once again revealed a neighbor, who was far from pleased with unexpected visitors and because of this we left my summer car a bit further away and walked a longer route to the location.



Here we are!



Every door was open and every window broken. The company ceased operations in 1989 and apparently nothing has been here since.



Greeted by a mess, again.



A large production room with no equipment left.



The wooden drums were used to process the skins in the early stages of production.



A closer look at one of the drums. Chrome was used in making the skins better suited for leather products, and probably some substance containing it was led to the drums. This also meant that the soil under and around the factory was seriously contaminated. The contamination levels were such, that in fact the authorities had warned that constant presence around the factory was a health hazard.



Strange wooden things, which probably also had a role in the leather production back in the days. Probably they were an important part of the production, as there were so many of them.



The view one floor up. This area looks like it has been modernized in the 1970's.



We had company.



A very old and broken scale.



Again the wall seems too modern to be from the 1940's.



Well. the elevator definitely isn't from the 1940's.



The top floor offices.



Looks like there were once important papers here.



The evening express. I've taken that train multiple times. And that's how I found the factory in the first place.

More photos: https://desertedfi...ther-factory-2020/

I published these photos way back in November. A local urbexer has commented, that the place is now out of bounds. The owners have blocked every single doorway and window and installed cameras. The place is really tightly shut and guarded.

So glad I managed to get in before that!
Helsinki, Finland
Re: Tour De Finland 2020
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
In the early 1950’s a mine was founded in a remote swamp area. As soon as it started operations, a small village was built around it. There were around 250 houses at the peak with some 1000 people living there.

The company strived to keep their employees happy in the middle of nowhere. They bought areas for recreation in the vicinity, built shops and services. And to keep them entertained, they built a multi purpose assembly hall for free time activities. The early 1960’s building hosted movies, dance nights and even sports were played there.

The story ends in a familiar way. The mine was closed in the early 1990’s and people started to move away. The shops, bank and post office closed, the assembly hall was abandoned.



Although the building is not in use anymore, somebody keeps cutting the grass. It wasn’t an overgrown jungle.



A-ha. Somebody had even been kind enough to hold the door open with something that looks like an old flag post.



At least it has been possible to play basketball here. There has probably also been a silver screen in this end or the other, as movies are mentioned as one activity, which has taken place here.



This is the former lobby. The use of natural light was clearly a theme here, and the sunroof provides just that despite all the doors and windows having been boarded shut. The main entrance is straight up front.



According to my sources there's a bowling alley in the basement. I didn't go there, though. I'm slightly afraid of the dark.



The ticket booth.



The cloakroom.



A final look at the hall before the journey continues.
Don't be a Maxx
Re: Tour De Finland 2020
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
Great stuff. Some unique finds
Helsinki, Finland
Re: Tour De Finland 2020
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
Thank you!

The road trip and story go on, still for a while.



Another small rural town, another former co-operative store. This is again the very distinct work of the architects of SOK. many similar examples once were the main source for groceries and other stuff for inhabitants in these towns.

I spotted this building for the first time in 2009 or 2010 and it has been in this state ever since. Apparently it can’t be demolished as it is protected, but nobody has made up any use to it.

The building was built in the 1940’s next to an old wooden co-operative store, which was located to the left of the picture. Downstairs was a grocery store, upstairs was a restaurant called the Goldfish.

In the 1960’s exactly the same happened here as happened in the other location I linked to earlier in this thread. The wooden part of the store was demolished, a large, low, one-storey high department store wing was constructed and connected to the old functionalistic part. According to a diploma work written about this location, the co-operative wanted to demolish this building, but the town made them keep it. So they coated the building with the same white metal as the new part.

In the late 1990’s changes happened again. The new store seen in the background was constructed behind the 1960’s wing, which was then demolished to make way for a parking lot. As this part was protected, it was left standing, empty.

The building was last used in 1998. The roof is leaking, the basement is flooding and it’s generally in a very bad condition. A diploma work done in 2016 suggests its conversion to a hotel-restaurant, but nothing has happened.

And probably nothing will happen in the near future.



Not exactly abandoned, but close to so. This is a house in an old mining village in the middle of nowhere. The mine closed in the 1980's, and people pretty much left. When newspapers in Finland list the cheapest apartments in the country, this village is usually on the top spot. You can get two bedrooms, a living room and a kitchen for 20 000 euros.

There are plans to reopen the mine, so maybe this place will still get a second chance.



Just another burnt out ruin? Definitely not.

Pekka Heikkinen & co is a more than 100 year old bakery famous for its bread in the town of Kajaani in Northern Finland. The building itself was designed by famous architect Eino Pitkänen, whose works have pretty much made Kajaani the capital of Finnish functionalistic architecture.

The bakery was built in 1947 and it still operated in full swing in the spring of 2018, when its roof caught fire. The cause was the worn out insulation of the chimney, which allowed it to release heat resulting in a fire.

Nobody got hurt. The company found a new location and the production of bread and pastries resumed a half a year later. Sadly the building was beyond repair. The landmark was demolished in 2021.

And this, my dear friends, is sadly the last entry of this roadtrip.

The very same day I got my summer car back from the maintenance, this part fell off.



The part was located under the engine to protect it from water and rocks, not that there was much to protect. The oil consumption was up to 1,2 litres / 2000 kilometers and I had realized that a rattling noise heard since The Killer Locomotive Memorial was that the protective rubbers of the engine had worn out making the engine shake against the body of the car.

Two hours later another soul left the body.



This part was used to protect my legs from the sharp edges of the rails where the driver seat was attached. It wasn’t important, but it started to look like the poor thing was now seriously falling apart.

And only a couple of more days had passed, when I realized that the engine didn’t sound normal anymore. The sound was metallic and sounded like it was coming through a pipe. I believe, that the cam belt was failing.

Then this happened.



The brakes had issues ever since I bought the car and the ABS hadn’t functioned in a while. The second light indicates that the Lambda sond has failed. This had its consequences. Fuel consumption went up from 7,8 to 9,6 litres / 100 km. I started having serious doubts about actually being able to complete my challenge about visiting all current and former municipalities of Finland in one summer.



So here I am cruising through the beautiful scenery of Kainuu, when the inevitable happens. The automatic transmission fails. I am left with only three functioning gears of four. The fuel consumption instantly goes up to heights I can’t sustain.



This holy trinity is such a beautiful sight. The gearbox, the engine and the brakes have all failed with 50 kilometers to the nearest town. What else do you need to run the car?

I managed to drive to the town, parked my car, ripped the front licence plate as a trophy and ordered the scrap man. The following morning a local guy arrived, asked what I wanted for the car and bought it for 50 euros to use as spare parts. He allowed me to wait for my friend to pick me up at his place, cooked lunch and asked if I wanted a drink.



An here is my poor summer car ready to become a parts donor while I head towards my former home town. We had been drinking all day with the buyer, and I passed out as soon as I boarded my friend’s car.

The road trip may be over, but this thread isn't. As my car broke down a full 50 municipalities before I managed to visit the final, 571th, I now had one and a half weeks time to roam in my former home town in the North.



This area is a late 1960’s – early 1970’s built central institution for the mentally disabled. This is where they lived, studied and were treated for decades.

But like the case is with mental asylums, time passed institutions like this. The patients have been moved to more modern and smaller institutions and this one has been emptied to make way for a new residential area.

The area was more like a city within a city. It was made up of ten separate buildings with different functions. The use of the area ended in 2019.



The building seen in the first picture was the administration building. This one was one of many identical ones, which housed the patients.



We did explore the entire, large area, but weren’t alone. There were several people walking their dogs and even a large group of young men painting a graffiti.



We didn’t find a point of entry. The most interesting thing we found was the graveyard of old garden swings.

And so my summer holidays were over. I left my former home town and came back home to the Capital Region and resumed my daily habit of going to the office. As September came, my weekly dance lessons started, too.

The weather was still beautiful and warm, and I had some strange surge of energy after my vacation. I decided to use a city bike to get from my home to the school we practiced in. After all it was only around 10 kilometers, although the area is not the most biker friendly in the country.

I had been dancing with this same group since a year ago (but not for a year thanks to the pandemic). I had paid attention to a rather large lot close to our training premises, which seemed empty.

It was formerly owned by a company running a large mall in downtown Helsinki. The area contained a huge car dealership, a petrol station and storage and manufacturing facilities. The lot had been vacated as a plan to construct apartments existed. Only the petrol station and one additional building would be preserved.



That day I noticed that work had started. The to be preserved petrol station and ad tower are to the left, the to be demolished car dealership is to the right and one of the factories is at the back.

I wasn’t happy with the sight. The summer had brought back my long lost passion for urban exploration, which I had lost back in 2017 after some failed photography projects. When I noticed that this location was vanishing, I thought I should become more active again. I wanted to explore and photograph places before they were destroyed.

I didn’t realize it yet, but this was the start of something. It may have been the roadtrip of a lifetime, but my golden age as an urban explorer had only started.

Durham Region
Female
Someday is NOT a day of the week !
Re: Tour De Finland 2020
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
Interesting posts and stories to accompany them.
Sorry about your car

Looking forward to your next additions
Finland
Male
How close can you go?
Re: Tour De Finland 2020
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
Does the broken lambda sensor really increase the fuel consumption that much? I think I've been well within the normal tolerances with both of my V70s even though the Brown Rocket had and the Silver Lightning has a faulty lambda, and the light comes on after a while whenever I reset the fault codes. It could explain the rather hefty fuel bill, though...

Oh well, a friend promised to sell me his stopgap low-mileage 60 mpg V50 1.6D this summer, so the Quicksilver only needs to pass one more inspection. The Turd sold within 30 minutes of putting up the ad online. I wonder if I'll break the record with a better-equipped and lower-mileage example. The oil consumption is phenomenal, though.
[last edit 4/25/2024 8:35 AM by Tupsumato - edited 2 times]
Helsinki, Finland
Re: Tour De Finland 2020
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
Posted by Tupsumato
Does the broken lambda sensor really increase the fuel consumption that much? I think I've been well within the normal tolerances with both of my V70s even though the Brown Rocket had and the Silver Lightning has a faulty lambda, and the light comes on after a while whenever I reset the fault codes. It could explain the rather hefty fuel bill, though...

Oh well, a friend promised to sell me his stopgap low-mileage 60 mpg V50 1.6D this summer, so the Quicksilver only needs to pass one more inspection. The Turd sold within 30 minutes of putting up the ad online. I wonder if I'll break the record with a better-equipped and lower-mileage example. The oil consumption is phenomenal, though.


The Lambda light usually either indicates a faulty lambda sensor or mass airflow sensor. I've broken both, and yes, it does increase the fuel consumption quite a lot.

How much do you want for your V70? I'm actually looking for a new summer car ;)
Finland
Male
How close can you go?
Re: Tour De Finland 2020
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
Posted by Deserted Finland

How much do you want for your V70? I'm actually looking for a new summer car ;)


I'll let you know when (if) it becomes available. Probably something reasonable. The previous one sold for something like 600 euro but it was due inspection in a month whereas this will have a fresh stamp when I put it for sale.

http://tromu.kapsi.fi/v.mp4 :3
[last edit 4/25/2024 9:10 AM by Tupsumato - edited 1 times]
Helsinki, Finland
Re: Tour De Finland 2020
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
Posted by Tupsumato


I'll let you know when (if) it becomes available. Probably something reasonable. The previous one sold for something like 600 euro but it was due inspection in a month whereas this will have a fresh stamp when I put it for sale.

http://tromu.kapsi.fi/v.mp4 :3



Although a V70 Mk1 would be just perfect, I think yours will be available a bit too late. I usually start my season around the 1st of May.

But thanks anyway!
Finland
Male
How close can you go?
Re: Tour De Finland 2020
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
Yeah, I think our schedules won't match. The earliest the car would be available is somewhere in late June/early July.

Maybe I'll call the guy who bought the previous one. He had a second son nearing driving age as well and obviously the younger brother can't have anything worse than the older one...
[last edit 4/25/2024 11:53 AM by Tupsumato - edited 1 times]
Helsinki, Finland
Re: Tour De Finland 2020
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
The road trip was over, but like I said, the story isn't. And now that the car business with Tupsumato is settled, the story goes on.



But wait a second, hasn't this building been featured here before?



This is indeed the Language House of the Fish Finger School featured here earlier. Like I said a few posts back, I vowed never to miss a location again. As I knew that the demolition of the school was approaching, I decided to try exploring it once more.



My friend couldn't join me, but I went on from where I was left the last time, climbing up to the teachers' apartment wing of the building. There wasn't much to see there, just empty apartments.



Next it was the time to see what the 1960's main school was all about.



The main entrance. I must admit that I've never seen such a destruction.



There were even large holes in the concrete walls and roof. I believe, that the military has used the school as a training ground. Nothing else can explain this, really.



The staircase split into two in the lobby. When looking at all this destruction, remember, that the school had been abandoned for just under a year.



A corridor.



Natural sciences classroom.



All the books and tests and other stuff had been left in the school. This assignment has been to read a book and answer questions about it.



No matter how much you hate the 1960's architecture, the use of light has been ingenious.



Even the school gym had faced total destruction. I wonder, where I can find a way to that balcony.



Bingo!



The best seats!



Again I just love the use of glass and light.

At this point I decided to call it quits. It was a grey evening at half past six. It was starting to get darker outside. That combined with the fact that the windows were boarded shut on the first floor made photography impossible.

In addition to that, a group of teenagers had entered. Although they were polite and greeted me, they started smashing things. The noise was such, that I expected the neighbors to call the cops any time soon.

Demolition started around a month later. By spring all buildings were gone.

More photos: https://desertedfi...ool-vantaa-2020-2/
Helsinki, Finland
Re: Tour De Finland 2020
Posted on Forum: UER Forum


This lovely shot is taken through the window of an intercity train.

I was serious about what I said about not letting interesting locations slip through my hands anymore. I had read about a cute little former school outside a regional town about to be demolished and decided to pay it a visit.

Before my trip I asked a local friend to go see if the place was still there. She sent one of her pupils on a scouting mission and when I got a message saying the school is still there and it’s all open doors, I booked a ticket.



But the intercity doesn’t stop in rural villages with closed schools. I had to change to a regional train in a town famous for its concrete architecture (not in a positive way).

This proved to be a real nostalgia trip. The national railway company changed its livery from red to green way back in 2009. Seems like they weren’t in a hurry to repaint their older fleet.



And so we are in the bustling metropole of Inkeroinen with a beautiful railway station.

They actually had an 19th century railway station in the village as in every other village along this line. Back in the early 1970’s they decided to modernize them all (read: demolish them and build cheap looking barracks.)



And here’s my destination, a cute little 1950’s village school. It was closed down years ago and the city tried to sell it. They found no buyers, so they decided to demolish it.



At this point I still thought that I would explore a primary school. I had no reason to expect otherwise.



Let's go look at the gym first.



I wish they still made them like this.



The ground floor corridor.



The woodworking class was pretty much the only space downstairs.



That's a lot of stuff.



The woodworking rooms actually made up most of the ground floor.



In addition to it there was only a narrow corridor with the teachers' study and some toilets. It seems, that life here ended in 2012.



Going upstairs then.



The fire services or the police seem to have practiced here.



Looks like I found the handwork classroom.



A home economics book for 8th graders. 8th grade is not primary school, it's secondary school. It does seem, that the school had a far wider scale of pupils than I originally expected.



Home economics isn't even taught until secondary school. Yet I managed to find the classroom and the spice shelf.



I suspect that they've been dead for some time now.



Welcome to learn some Finnish.



Next the school kitchen. This is a highly unusual feature. The kitchen and canteen usually always are on the ground floor or even in the basement. Not here.



The top floor then.



A similar corridor than downstairs.



I next found a storage room with signs on doors describing what is inside the cupboards. They start in meticulous detail and end up getting bizarre. The left cupboards contains notebooks, like grid notebooks, big notebooks and little notebooks, the one on the right just different notebooks.



The next random fact: a weekly schedule for high school studies in the building. Are you actually trying to tell me now, that pupils from age seven to age 19 have been taught here simultaneously?



The end of the top floor corridor.



Finally the attic.



This book really is called ‘Numeracy And Life’ and it is from the 1960’s. I mean, really?

At this point disaster struck. I ran out of memory on my phone. I tried deleting some apps to manage through the school, but ever since this moment in October 2020 my phone has been chronically full. Despite moving a lot of photos to my cloud storage, I’ve never had less than 30 000 photos on my phone since.



Demolition of the school started roughly around a month later and it was down by the end of the year. I drove past the lot last summer and it’s just a sandpit with bushes nowadays.

What a waste.

But there's a lot more to see here: https://desertedfi...l-inkeroinen-2020/
Helsinki, Finland
Re: Tour De Finland 2020
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
After the visit to the school a chain of events started unfolding. And because of that chain of events this thread exists.

A few days later I got a message from a friend. She was pregnant and very close to giving birth. Her usual photographer had fallen ill, and as I had practiced portraits by photographing her in abandoned buildings years ago, she asked me to document her final stage.

I told her I hadn’t really photographed in years. I couldn’t guarantee that my photos would be of any quality, but she said it doesn’t matter. As the camera of my latest iPhone was way better than my old DSLR, I didn’t even care to take my camera with me. We spent a wonderful two hours in a forest by the seaside and had a cup of coffee afterwards.

When I came home and looked through the photos, I was surprised by them. I was especially impressed by the beautiful, soft light, something, which I hadn’t really been very good at capturing.

This encouraged me to open my archives for the first time ever. The photos weren’t of world class quality, but I realized that I was the only one expecting them to be that. If only I’d be better at photo editing, maybe I’d publish them one day, I thought to myself.

I was in the middle of massive changes in my life. After six years of working with the same group of people, I had finally managed to secure a permanent position elsewhere. My roommate was moving in with her boyfriend and I would be living on my own in the Capital region for the first time. The night after this photo shoot I was trying to get some sleep in the middle of cardboard boxes, when suddenly an idea crossed my mind.

I would start an urbex photoblog. I would start right from where it started and write it as a diary. But first I would learn how to properly use Photoshop.

A few days later I matched my old colleague on Tinder. I usually swipe my friends to the right as a joke, and she did the same to me. We really weren’t serious about going on a date, but as we started talking, we decided to go have a beer anyway to do a little catch up. That was when I told about my idea to this graphic designer friend of mine.

“Photoshop? Why would you do things the hard way? Why don’t you use Lightroom instead?”

The answer was that we were taught Photoshop at school. Nobody mentioned Lightroom. I came home, downloaded a trial and started a blog. It was only a blog. Some weeks later things again got out of hand and I spent one night awake building a whole website. Things always tend to get out of hand when I’m involved.

That's how Deserted Finland was born. When I launched it, my friend, who knows me all too well, said, that I'll get bored and give up in three weeks. Well, it's been three and a half years, and I've built one of the biggest Finnish urbex websites in terms of content. The aim is not to take perfect pictures, the aim is to document vanishing buildings and ways of life and to allow people to follow my footsteps around the buildings.

And speaking of footsteps...

My godson was turning six, so it was time for my yearly visit to my old home town in mid-November. As usual the weather was cold, windy and didn’t really encourage to outside activities. Yet we always went somewhere with the family.

And this time it was to be a very disputed place right in the heart of my childhood memories.



This is an old grain mill. The mill itself is to the left, the grain silos are right up front. They were built in several phases between 1958 and 1963. There was a dispute already before they were built, as the silos blocked the road to the harbor right behind them. The town gave permission to build them as the company was one of the biggest employers in town.

The mill operated until 1992. After that the buildings were hired to small businesses and the silo capacity was rented out to another operator, who stored grain there. This is where my childhood comes into the picture. I lived two blocks away and we hired a garage in the building to the left for some years until we got one from our own house. My family actually worked for one organization, which was headquartered in one of these buildings.

Most of the buildings were sold to a foundation, who renovated them and a Swedish speaking university moved in. The silos were sold to a student apartment organization, who wanted to convert them into student apartments. The plans were ready and the whole complex got protection status.

There were leadership changes and the plan to convert the silos was axed. They have stood empty since the late 1990’s and a plan to demolish the silos and replace them with a block of flats was approved by the courts just before this picture was taken.

Demolition started last summer. Now they are down.




During that visit to my home town I realized that the unthinkable had happened. My godson’s father had become somewhat of an urban explorer himself. He had been taking a walk outside town with their kids and dog and told me that there was something he wanted to show me. So we loaded me and the family of four into a car and drove to a recreation area. There, literally in the middle of nowhere we found an interesting place.



A vintage Saab, an old Ford Escort Express and a shed of some kind.



And a very old caravan.



Let’s just say that it had seen better days.



Now hold it. A food coupon, a festival ticket and a festival pass to Kaustinen Folk Music Festival, the largest and most traditional of its kind in Finland and something which I visit yearly. These were from 1995 and 2000, when nothing in the world would get me there.



One final look inside the Saab. It’s not too often you get to take that.

The place remains a mystery. According to aerial photos the lot has been like this for years. There isn’t even a road leading to the area anymore.



On the second last day of 2020 it was time to board a train. I had made a purchase the previous night and the thing I wanted was in only one store in Finland. The others were out of stock and didn’t know when they would get more. So that’s why I took the tram to the station, a train to Turku and a bus to Raisio.



It was a dark and wet trip. But eventually I got what I wanted.



To the left is my obsolete old 1000D which I sold without taking one more shot with it. To the right is my new partner in crime, a 250D, which I’m hanging high hopes on.

So losing my summer car wasn't the end. It was where it all started.


Helsinki, Finland
Re: Tour De Finland 2020
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
The year is now 2020, but the tour continues!

Eager to test my new camera, I travelled to another city to catch an abandonment. I had read news about a former chapel in the very center of the city of Lahti. It was used by the church until the mid-90’s when it became a daycare center. Abandoned in 2015 due to bad condition, it was considered beyond repair. It was sold to a company, which wanted to demolish it and replace it with a block of flats.



And here it is. The church, which owned it, was a subgroup of a Lutheran revival movement. They strictly disapproved drinking, drugs, popular music, movies, theatre, make up, piercings and sexual minorities. Not a place for me, really.



The building was located on a small hill. And this is where the congregation walked up to the building for their church services.



The building was very beautiful and everybody would have much wanted to have it preserved. It was originally built to be used only during the warm season and for short periods of time at once. When it was converted to a daycare center, it suffered irreversible damage.

Despite its values, it was so rotten, that even the museum approved its demolition.



I still couldn’t find a safe way in, so I called my friend. He took me sightseeing around town and booked the sauna in his home. And so we cooked dinner, drank beer and had a lovely evening, which this church wouldn’t have approved because of the beer.

Some weeks later I was on the road again. My friend was moving back to the North to do her practical training. She had no driver’s licence, so I agreed to rent a van in the capital region on a Friday evening, drive to the West, spend a night on her couch and drive her up North the following day. We’d then unload the van, go to our joint favorite restaurant, have a few beers and then I’d drive straight home and return the car on Sunday. Her parents would cover the costs.

But just a week before the move was to take place, I read a news article about a former school being demolished. Built in 1937 and enlarged in the 1960’s, it had been educating Swedish speaking pupils until 2014, when it was abandoned because of bad condition. Now they wanted to build a private daycare center to replace it.



Here it is. I’m not sure, if the entire facade visible is the original 1937 school, or is it just the grey part to the center and right of the photo. The local museum authorities wanted to protect the oldest part of the school, but the city really didn’t greet this with enthusiasm.



There was an annex on the back side, and this one was definitely from the 1960’s or 1970’s. Surely nobody would miss that.

But there was no entry. As the plans for the daycare center were progressing, I thought this school would be a lost case, which I never got the chance to enter.
Helsinki, Finland
Re: Tour De Finland 2020
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
And so came March and something of a rarity: a paid winter holiday. I guess I'm now an adult.

I traveled to Eastern Finland to try to make my way to a former mental asylum, which served its last years as a normal hospital.



This is where the municipal home started in the 1920's.



Someone's been here. I wasn't lucky, though.



The area is for sale. It's probable that the older building will be preserved while this 1960's hospital building will be demolished.



Sadly I couldn't find a point of entry. Time to change the city.



This here is a local landmark, which was at least a hotel and a book store during its active years. The town wanted to demolish it, the residents wanted to keep it. Eventually the town won and it's now gone.



And this here is originally a bakery, which later became a community center. Demolition started two days later.

I actually contacted the town's property manager a few weeks earlier in matters related to my job. I asked for permission to photograph inside and he promised me the keys. I still wonder why I didn't call him and ask for them while I was around.



So here I am waiting for a train home at the local railway station. And I suddenly realized, that this was the first and only time when I would wait a train here.

Back in the 1960’s somebody in control of the state railroad company got a magnificent idea. Railway stations would no longer be just railway stations. They would combine rail and bus traffic, and when these brand new buildings were built they also included municipal and state government offices and business premises.

Five such stations were built between the 1960’s and early 1980’s before somebody realized that the idea wasn’t such a good one after all. Since then two of these stations are set to be demolished – one to make way for housing and health care buildings with a station integrated into them. And this one to be replaced by a smaller station.

The reasons could be called pragmatic. The station is around 45 years old and is in the need of large renovations. Meanwhile the city has lost almost a third of its inhabitants since the inauguration of the station and it is in a place well situated for traffic, but far from the city center. No offices or business premises are needed in this part of the town. It is simply too large and in the wrong place

And although the building still functions as a station, most of it is empty. The district court has moved away, so has the town authority and a private doctor’s office. Demolition crews are going to move in as soon as a big repair work on the rails leading past the station is complete. Or so they said.



Former ticket counters.



Not a very beautiful building.



As the district court, which occupied most of the second and third floors has already left, there’s more empty space than there are tenants.



The office corridor above the station lobby. Unfortunately all office corridors were closed, this one with a locked glass door.

The station was supposed to be demolished in 2022 and the work on the new one should be well underway. The increase in the price of construction materials meant, that they cancelled the plans. They instead now plan to demolish one wing and the top floor, renovate the rest and build a new roof. The plans actually look pretty good to me.

So far nothing has happened. Except that the old station now has even less tenants than during my visit.

Durham Region
Female
Someday is NOT a day of the week !
Re: Tour De Finland 2020
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
Enjoy the continuing saga of your journeys
Helsinki, Finland
Re: Tour De Finland 2020
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
Sorry for the long break in posting. I've been busy travelling and exploring all summer. I've photographed so much, that this thread will continue forever, unless something unexpected happens.

Back in late March I was heading out on a date. The girl knew about my hobby and told me about an abandoned location very close to my home. I was a bit skeptical, as I lived quite in the middle of Helsinki. But she was right. There was an old villa.



Back in the late 19th century this area was still pretty much outside the city center. Back in 1888 a local butcher decided to build this villa in a rural valley. The original owner owned the place until the first world war, when it got military use.

After that the place was owned by the late butcher’s estate. The city had now grown around the valley, which had become a popular recreation area. At some point a café was located in the villa.

The next decades were not so glorious for the house. It became a rental house with very small rooms, some of which didn’t even have a stove. Eventually the city bought it and rented it back in the 1980’s to one of the most famous charity organizations in Finland. The organization was allowed to house homeless people in there. Apparently the place was in an awful condition.

Back in 2002 it was renovated and as it wasn’t fit to be used as apartments anymore, the house became a storage facility for the charity. It was abandoned in 2017 and occupied by a group of anarchists in 2019. They were eventually thrown out.

Since then the villa has been guarded around the clock. There have been plans of new use, but the city hasn’t approved them.

And this is just one of the many historic villas owned by the city, which stand abandoned. The city really is notorious for letting them rot.



No point of entry, unfortunately.

During the winter I had accumulated a long list of potential abandoned locations near my home to test my new camera. The only reason I hadn’t done it yet was the fact that I hate winters and cold.

But it was already almost mid-April and the city bike season had started. I had a rare weekend off, so I thought it was safe to plan a trip to some locations nearby.

Boy, was I wrong. When the day came, it was almost freezing. The sun was shining, though, so I decided to leave anyway.



My first location was this former art museum. Built in 1976 it was abandoned in 2012, because the museum no longer wanted to take art there. The reason were air quality problems and reports of mold in the basement.

Nothing was ever detected in analysis, but the building stayed empty. The city is currently wondering, whether it will find new use to it or demolish it. Planning is underway.



No point of entry here, either. The city guards its property better than it takes care of it.

Like I said earlier, the city has a large amount of old, valuable villas without use. It also places strict restrictions on their future use, which makes finding buyers or tenants hard . Well, it also has more valuable properties looking for new use.

Such as this mansion.





The yellow building is a 19th century dance pavilion built by the mansion’s Russian owner. Back in the days the mansion was famous for its lavish garden parties.



The city has been looking for a new use to the mansion and pavillion at least since 2017, but no viable plans have emerged. They put the property for sale in 2022. In 2023 the anarchists already featured in another story appeared, and occupied the mansion. This time they left on their own. But the property is still looking for a new use.

No point of entry here, either.

A huge sleet storm began. In the intensifying sleet storm I continued my way towards my next location. I had never been there or seen it, just read about it in the papers.



This is a former elementary school. Designed by two famous architects it was built way back in 1957 on the outskirts of a new suburb. The suburb itself became a national landmark later on.

Although perhaps not evident by its current state, the building is considered somewhat revolutionary. Its interesting features are sunroofs, which provide light inside, external walls made of light wooden elements and direct access outside from the classrooms.

The school was closed in 2017 because of air quality problems. The city would like to demolish it, but due to its location and architecture this has proven to be difficult.



As customary to old schools from this era, a house was built for the teachers to live in. This location actually included several of them.



The only higher part of the school probably houses the school gym.

But still no point of entry.



Around a year has passed since the last mention, and the pool still just stands there. Back in April 2021, when I took this photo, no decisions had yet been made about its future.

As of late 2023 the buildings still stand empty. In 2022 the city decided that the old pool would be renovated and partially rebuilt to preserve its original architecture. They hired a contractor, but after nine months of intense negotiations they pulled off. The price they had originally agreed upon couldn’t pay for the extensive repairs. The city is now seeking a new contractor.

But still no point of entry. What a disappointing post this is turning out to be.



There’s another abandoned school on the other side of the area. This one was completed in the early 1960’s and was also designed by a famous architect especially renowned for his schools.



A striking feature of the front yard is this shelter, which runs the entire length of the school. It divides the yard into smaller sections, each of which had their own entrance.



There were a lot of moderately spectacular graffiti in the back yard. As I didn't gain entry, I won't be posting more. But there's more here: https://desertedfi...ary-school-2021-2/



A day after my sleet filled adventure to former schools and other public buildings, I went on another trip. This time the sun was shining and everything was beautiful again.

I next headed to an old villa, which I had found through my connections. It was built in 1915 by a railroad inspector to be his family’s summer place.



The villa was extremely beautiful and extremely sad. I mean why would such a beautiful building in such a popular area be in such a state.

But at this point I started feeling a pain in my sole. I have a history of a recurring sole injury, which reduces me to crutches for two weeks. So I decided to quit, go home, rest and return after a while...

So more coming up.
Helsinki, Finland
Re: Tour De Finland 2020
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
Another day, another adventure.



And another one of the villas neglected by the city.



This one was a beauty. Unfortunately there was no access. More photos from here: https://desertedfi...easide-villa-2021/



And another one. This is a summer villa built in the 1950’s by the founder of a furniture company. The location was determined by the fact that his wife’s parents had their own summer villa a stone’s throw away.

More photos here: https://desertedfi...iation-villa-2021/

Wait a second, did I say a stone's throw away?



Here we have it. Still no access. But once again more photos: https://desertedfi...summer-villa-2021/



So what do we have here? Another villa?

Well, yes and no. This is just the villa’s caretaker’s little cottage.

The main villa was built back in 1938 by a shipowner and yachtsman and sold to the city in 1966. Oh yes, the city is involved again.

Between the 1960’s and 2014 it was used as a day camp center for local kids. Every morning a bus would collect them from around town, they would spend the day resting and recreating in the nature by the sea, and they would go back home in the evening.

All of this was written in a newspaper article the previous October. The main point of the article was, that a day camp center, popular in the 1980’s, was now abandoned and vandalized in a unique location.

Two days later there was another article. The paper had interviewed the tenant and caretaker of the center, who lived there for 25 years. In the 1990’s he started inviting musicians to train and record on the premises, and for years and years top Finnish bands and artists did this. The tenant told them not to reveal the location in interviews, so that unauthorized visitors wouldn’t be attracted. That’s why the place wasn’t common knowledge.

During the summers it was all day camps again. Even commercials and films were shot in the area, but in 2014 the city evicted the tenant. Everything has remained shut ever since 2015. But a few weeks later there was yet another article. A group of punkers had occupied the place. They were thrown out and the buildings sealed with plywood.



Here we have the main building.

Still no luck entering. But again more photos: https://desertedfi...-camp-center-2021/

Now for the final location of my four hour walk around the seashores.



This property is called Vuoranta. It was built in 1970 and originally served as the education center of Alko, the Finnish alcohol monopoly company. In the early 1990’s even hotel activity started in the buildings, and when Alko closed the education center down, it continued as a hotel.

The hotel was in the buildings until 2010. It served as accommodation for asylum seekers during the 2015-16 migrant crisis, but was abandoned by its Russian owner after that. Earlier in 2021 a Finnish property developer bought the protected buildings with the aim of reconstructing them into a nursing home for elderly people.



The main entrance. The steel doors weren’t very inviting.



Views from the balcony.



The balcony continues. When the building was built in 1970, it was in the middle of the forest. Now neighbors are close.



So this building contained a sauna and a lounge according to the sign. There’s also a pool there. But there was no way in here either.



There was a separate accommodation building next to the main building.



The front side.



Views from the courtyard behind the building.



I would maybe give it a different rating.

Still no point of entry. But more photos: https://desertedfi...nta-helsinki-2021/

Like I said, I walked for four hours without managing to enter a single location. What a waste of time.


Helsinki, Finland
Re: Tour De Finland 2020
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
I hadn’t owned a car since my summer car broke down the previous August in a very remote corner of Finland and I sold it for scrap. And I really hadn’t missed my car since then. Although I had moved again the previous autumn, I still lived in a very central location in the capital region. Because of the traffic, lack of parking spaces and expensive parking, owning a car here is a nuisance. And thanks to an efficient public transport system there is no need for one.

This didn’t prevent me from making up an April Fool’s Day joke about having bought an identical car to the one I had the previous summer. And I went on telling, I would again try to visit all current and former municipalities during one summer, like i did the previous one until my car failed me just before the end.

It was one of my best April Fool’s Day jokes of all time. Everybody believed the story. Most people said, that they had been certain all the time, that I would try to conquer Finland in one summer again.

That was when I realized that I actually missed having a summer car. I missed driving to sunsets, I missed urbexing. I missed everything about the previous summer. I shared this in my Instagram stories and things started to escalate pretty quickly.

I had a friend contact me. She said her old Volvo would sit idle for the summer as she was cruising around in her own summer car. We agreed, that I would hire the Volvo for the summer and return it in the autumn. And less than a month later I went to pick this beauty up.



She is a mid-90’s Volvo 960, the flagship of the manufacturer. All the best equipment, all the latest technology and most comfort. And of course a 6-cylinder engine.

But this summer I wasn’t going to tour all the municipalities. I had three weeks of paid leave and a long list of locations I wanted to visit. I decided to make several road trips to Finland with a long list of abandoned places. Although this thread is called Tour De Finland 2020, it's time for Tour de Finland 2021. And I was certain, that it would be the urbex summer of a lifetime.

And now that I had the car...



I first drove to an abandoned house in a pretty isolated location in the capital region.



If anybody knows what that thing in front of the window is, please tell me.



An easy entry.



The hall. I can’t explain why, but at this point the place started giving me odd vibes. The stairs don't lead anywhere. That thing up front is not a door, it's a chimney.



There was both new and old in the kitchen. And a pink fluffy unicorn.



The living room, which is one of the strangest I've ever seen in Finland. First of all doors like that are not commonly used in Finland. Secondly, wall panels like that are not used commonly in Finland. And thirdly the furniture and the carpet are way too luxurious for a rural Finnish house. This looks more like a villa in the South of France.



This window is also very strange. Not only is it of a style, which I’ve never seen, but it also doesn’t match with the window frame outside, which is much larger and of a different shape. The strange scaffolding is also located right next to this window.



One view from upstairs. There was also a balcony, but the handrail was missing.



All the surfaces upstairs were covered with wood. Yet another interesting feature.

As usual, there is more: https://desertedfi...d-home-espoo-2021/

The house was completely destroyed by fire in April 2023.
Helsinki, Finland
Re: Tour De Finland 2020
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
The capital region is a funny place in terms of urban exploration. Land is expensive and there’s a constant lack of apartments. This means, that buildings are often demolished directly after becoming vacant. The window of finding access to them is very narrow.

But the funny thing is that here and there there are loads of abandoned one family houses, which have stood empty for years. They have often become uninhabitable, but finding lots for new one family houses is so difficult that they surely would find a buyer, who would just demolish the house and build a new one. For some reason or another this doesn’t happen, and the old houses just stand empty.

Here’s one of them. Or at least should be.



Although the roof was growing moss and looked like it was starting to fall apart, I wasn’t quite sure about this one. The lot wasn’t too overgrown and all windows were intact.

I could have gone closer, but I wasn’t really sure about it. In addition to the unknown state of the building the neighbors on both sides were on their back yards, and the houses were really close. They were literally less than 10 meters away.

So I was unlucky this time. But luckily the Finnish summer days are long and dawn comes early. I will be back.



A long, long time ago a small rural house was built on fields next to a railroad. The place seemed good, as several neighboring houses appeared in the coming years.

In the early 1960’s the peace was broken when a motorway was built right next to the small house. Its location remained rural until the 2000’s, when the urban area with its block of flats started coming closer and closer.

At some point it was abandoned.



A bright green 1990’s Toyota Hiace wasn’t something I expected to find here.



A view from the window. The hut has been very primitive, and although it seems that there has once been a floor, it is no more.



It looks like the window has been made into a door at some point.



I first thought this was an early 2000’s mp3-player, but it’s not. It’s an Italian game called My Life by Giochi Preziosi. Quite a random find.

A little more from this location: https://desertedfi...railside-hut-2021/



And here we have the neighboring house. Unfortunately an arsonist has made it first.



Everything has burned apart from the fireplace. That probably wasn’t the source of fire then.



There even was a burnt out toilet.

It wasn't safe to enter this place. There are a few more pictures, though: https://desertedfi...-burned-home-2021/

My final location that day was somewhat strange. It was a large old farm house on the outskirts of the capital region. In old Google Street View Pictures from 2009 it was already clearly abandoned. Plastic was covering its windows and its front door was shut with boards.

It soon turned out that the area had changed quite a bit since the Google car had been there.



Once this was one of the largest houses in the village and on a very large yard. Now the yards and fields had been sold to build a new residential area around this old beauty.

Although I usually cover all details, which reveal the location of the buildings I visit, there’s no need to do that here anymore. The blue sign is from a real estate broker, who advertises this as the chance to renovate this to a future home.

But nobody will renovate it. It’s in such a bad condition, that demolition permit had already been granted, when I arrived. The building was listed on the detail plan to be retained, but in the end it was in such a bad condition, that this was impossible. Plans are currently underway to enable the construction of two new houses on the lot.



The back door is open. Well, in fact both back doors were open. The other one has stairs leading up, the other one led to the ground floor. Unfortunately the neighbors were outside enjoying the spring and having a barbecue. I didn’t wish to risk being seen this time.

So some successes, some failures during the first exploration with my new summer car. I guess, I just have to come back at a better time.
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