The Old Roundhouse – by Gatsby


All articles and images are © of Hollow Hills Photography and are not to be reused without written permission.

Hollow Hills Issue #2 Fall 2005


GreyKat phoned me early in the afternoon of Friday, July 29th 2005 wanting to know if I was going out exploring at all that night. Of course! We began the usual “What do you want to do?” conversation. I thought of the roundhouse and mentioned it to him. Perfect.


D_Wrex had shown interest in participating as well, but couldn’t make it. In the end, it was still just the two of us. No problemo, it was an ideal mission for a small group anyway. I went on the internet to see if I could get some kind of address while GK drove over to my place. By the time he arrived, I had the information that we needed to locate the spot. I jumped into his car with my gear and we were off.

As we pulled up to the site, we immediately realized that it wasn’t the abandoned location that we expected. Rather, a highly active rail yard was in its place! We did notice, however, a few scattered buildings that appeared to be unused – including the historic roundhouse! Our spirits rose up once again and dominated our collaborated composure.

Parking the car in the traditional inconspicuous area, a shattering truth stomped out my end of the raised spirit. I FORGOT MY CAMERA!! Luckily, GreyKat had his along, and he usually agrees to let me steal his shots from the gallery. Heh.

OK, now comes the exciting part – finding a way in. I love this part! It’s not often anymore in the Twin Cities area that you get to infiltrate a place that doesn’t have an entry point that at least 3,000 people know about, so we were planning on making the most of it. First investigating the formal entrance, we saw that it was secured by a tall gate which only slid open to those who passed a clearance check. More than one vehicle exited through this gate in the 30 seconds it took for us to walk across the end of the driveway, confirming the occupation of the property. I remembered seeing a cemetery on the property line, and suggested an attempt to enter through there. GreyKat had the same idea, so we began to walk around to the backside, not wanting to attract attention too close to our destination. While maintaining our casual appearance, we kept an eye on the far end of the cemetery for a potential entry point. GK pointed out that there was razor wire on top of the fence along the rail yard side of the cemetery’s edge. Jeez. Alright, the night was still young, there had to be several other options. We soon came to the end of the cemetery, and followed it back to the seemingly impenetrable rail yard. Another gate appeared as we approached. This one had no security person or device as far as we could see, so we hopped it and dashed into a shadow.

We found ourselves in a tough position. The closest building to us was a good 500 feet away, with only floodlighting to separate it from us. No more shadows to dash into. Shedding any fear we had of being seen, we confidently began striding across the expanse, our goal being a rail car on the left side of the building. As we walked, we could hear lots of activity coming from an undecided direction. Hard working rail yard hands were unaware that they were contributing atmosphere to our adventure. The rail car was near now, offering its shadow to us. From here we could see some of the activity down the tracks, away from where we were headed. Turning to the building at hand, we began concentrating on its options for entry. It was about five stories tall, and took up about as much space on the ground as MRRC. We stayed close to the wall, paying as much attention to the workers as scouting for a way in. Finding every window bricked and every doorway locked, we paused to contemplate on getting to the roof. No way. Crawl through a drainpipe? Nope. At this point, we distinctly heard someone whistling around the corner! It was one of those carefree whistles that isn’t exactly a song. Just as I peeked out, it stopped. There was no one there. This seemed like a good time to move on.

We headed straight out to the middle of the yard so we could get a view of all the buildings around us. There were fluorescent yard lights everywhere, so it was really hard to see anything without shielding our eyes. As we peered northwest, we discovered the main security office, only 100 feet in front of us. This also seemed like a good time to move on. At that point, we simply headed in the opposite direction of everything we’d seen so far, strangely positioning us square in front of the roundhouse.

What a feeling you get from standing next to this historic place! You can just about see the ghosts of trains moving through these massive archways. The memories that lie within this structure are fading with its own rigidity. We stood there in awe for a moment before scouting. This is the part where urban explorers get a little emotional, because it always feels like an effort to revive a dying life. By getting in and appreciating its magnificence, we permanently save part of its dignity.

Currently, the entire building makes a half-circle. We began scouting from the outside of the circle, working our way around to the inner grounds. The first thing we found was a hole in the ground that appeared to lead into what looked like a crawlspace underneath the building. As it was, it was too small to fit through, so we ethically enlarged it slightly. As I overturned a piece of jagged cement, a couple of large centipedes darted off into the shadows. Since I hate centipedes and GreyKat wasn’t keen on slithering over jagged pieces of cement before checking for other options, we declined to enter. Just at that moment, we heard commotion along the tracks, not far away. It was a locomotive being directed by workers with flashlights! We laid low next to the centipedes, strangely feeling a kinship with them suddenly. We studied the movement of the activity, making sure that it wasn’t headed our way. We noticed what they were doing – hooking up to the same rail car that offered it’s shadow to us not 10 minutes earlier! Adrenaline replenished, we continued our search for an entrance. A ladder appeared to us, and I volunteered to check the roof while GreyKat studied the local exterior. I immediately saw that they had child-proofed the ladder. The rungs were protected from intruders up to 12 feet tall. I remembered what I learned from Bruce Lee and easily bypassed the security measure.


The roof! Ah, the roof. Any experienced urban explorer can relate. You cannot “make it quick” on a rooftop, especially rooftops that make you believe you’re on the set of Mary Poppins during the dancing chimneysweep scene. I thoroughly checked every inch with a smile on my face while GreyKat painstakingly avoided being detected by the rail yard hands. Unfortunately, I didn’t find anything that helped us achieve our goal. In fact, the entire roof was highly unstable, so I was somewhat happy to return to solid ground.

While I was up top, GreyKat had discovered a broken window which was too small to squeeze through, but offered a teasing view of the interior. Two rail cars were close by, contributing no more to the industry anymore than the roundhouse itself. We were glad to see them, though! By the way, during this time, an air conditioner in a nearby office building kept starting up loudly, making us jump 4 feet in the air every stinking time.

When we finally made it to the end of the half-circle, we rounded the corner to find a floodlit area with a motion detector, obviously guarding the vulnerable equipment we noticed laying all over the place. OK, we’d just have to go around the other way. Upon reaching the other end, GreyKat found a window that looked like a possibility. It was conveniently located behind tall weeds, so we could work at our leisure. It was obviously an original window, almost falling out of it’s frame upon touching it gently. After a few minutes of GreyKat fondling, we were inside. Wow, I guess we really are in love with old buildings!


The interior! How can I describe this? Saying “it was beautiful” doesn’t cut it. In fact, you’d have to have been there. It was dark enough inside to allow our imaginations to override reality, so it almost felt like we traveled back in time. The windows are covered with an industrial style plastic layer, so the light seeping through was extremely dim and diffused. GreyKat set up his camera and began recording the ambience. Since I didn’t have mine along, I wandered through the corridors, recording the scene in my memory. All the rails are still there. The giant arched doors are all intact. The light fixtures seem to be original. Yep, this place is truly a gem.


By the time GreyKat caught up with me, we had both come to the disappointing conclusion that we would have to find another way into the rest of the building, for a wall stood between it and us. Apparently, they sectioned off different areas for various uses after they stopped using it as a train repair center.

We found a door that admitted us to the inner yard, and once again we were slapped in the face with another unreal scene. Once the busy epicenter of the facility, this area now stands desolate, resembling a train depot in a ghost town. We found the rotating bridge absent, but the circular trench was never filled in. There is a fairly tall tree growing inside of it, telling us that this lonely state has been the theme for a long time. Fortunately, all of the tracks leading to the pit are still in place. We hopped down into the hole to search for anything interesting. We found part of a straw broom, an old picture frame, some railroad ties, and the cement base for the pivot. Besides these items, a miniature forest was discovered.


After we climbed back out, GreyKat almost immediately noticed another extremely sexy window. This one was unlocked, so no foreplay was necessary. The room we found ourselves in was a small office, which was very messy. Papers were strewn about as though some vandal got to it first. This was doubtful though, because it was the only room found in disarray. The area outside of this office was huge – big enough to drive a train through, I thought. Since we found railroad tracks running through it, I didn’t say it out loud. An addition was made to the roundhouse in the early 20th century which could be accessed through this section. It was apparently the “modern” repair area, with improved access to the belly of locomotives, and more general workspace in between the tracks. We returned to our circular journey after exploring the rectangular addition. A locker room was discovered shortly thereafter. Behind this, another sectional wall stopped our advancement.

This is my favorite part of the story, because this is where I got to get dirty. GreyKat had earlier noticed a crawlspace access panel on the floor. We figured it was probably where we would have come up if we had taken the centipede route. I suggested going down there to see if there was another panel in the next room that we could pop out of. Just before I descended, GK discovered a second panel, closer to our destination. However, it wouldn’t open. Since he didn’t feel like crawling any more than was necessary, I volunteered to go down the first panel and try to open the second from underneath. Just as I touched the top of the ladder going down, it fell apart like a 122 year old wooden ladder should. It was only five feet down, so I carefully hopped in, avoiding the corpse of the ladder. I found myself in a tunnel, not a crawlspace. My natural habitat! The walls were lined with old cables, and there was an amateur boardwalk over the muddy floor. It was dark, spooky, and decrepit – I loved it! I wanted to take my time, but there was someone depending on my service. I had a hard time finding the second panel, because, as I soon found out, it was hidden by spider webs. I had planned on trying to push it open with my back, but I would’ve enjoyed that no more than the spiders would’ve, so I looked for something to pound it open with. That tool ended up being one

of the boards from the floor. The natural seal broke only after pounding for 5 minutes. GK handed the gear down and joined me.

Just ahead of our position was a cocky wall that thought it could stop us. It made the mistake of carelessly leaving an opening at the bottom on the left. We only had to lie on our stomachs and slither through the mud to get past it. I was destined to go first, I guess. Just as my head poked out the other side, I came face to face with the end of an open drain pipe. Not more than 3 inches inside, there was a demon spider. I paused not unlike someone confronted with a pissed off cobra. I expected to be attacked in the same way D_Wrex and I were attacked by a demon spider in the sewers! Miraculously, I inched my way past the pipe and lived to tell about it. Finding myself completely intact, I yelled back to GreyKat and warned him about the spider residence. He apparently would’ve rather not known about it beforehand, I sensed, by his low-toned remark. He was fortunately able to persuade the demon to continue resembling a gargoyle instead of a flying monkey. Not 10 feet farther, our hopes were entertained by the discovery of another panel! We needed only to succeed in popping it to claim complete success. I used my back on this one, not afraid of normal spiders anymore after our last obstacle. It opened fairly easily, however my shirt filled up with loose rust very nicely.

Scanning the room we fought so hard to infiltrate, we realized it was the same section we peered into through a broken window a few hours earlier! Yep, there were the two rail cars that cheered us on, no doubt longing visitors. There’s that dark corner that kept its mouth shut. Hmm, now we’d be able to get it to talk! After having tea with the friendly rail cars, we moved on to the dark corner. It talked alright, but offered little to none as far as interesting information.

The next section of the roundhouse was easily accessible. Cut and dry chain-link fencing in place of a door, with no reason to stay in its place. Brushing the fence aside with the wave of a hand, the room was open to visitors. It was the most well lit area we’d seen so far. For this reason, it was presently the most photogenic. GreyKat began setting up his camera while I tapped my toe, still mad at myself for forgetting mine. This room seemed to be the most used section of the roundhouse. It had become a sort of “garage” for utility vehicles. In fact, this area felt used enough to make us a little nervous about being there. Just when we started talking about that very thing, a sound outside the wall gave us the shivers. It was the sound of someone unlocking the garage door! UE instinct forced us to dash into one of those uninteresting dark corners. It was disconcerting knowing that the first thing someone does upon entering a dark room is turn the lights on. After about a minute, we decided that no one was coming in. The sound was gone. We inched our way toward the door and listened closer. Nothing. We looked out the window. Nobody. The sound we had heard was the EXACT sound of someone fiddling with their keys, trying to unlock a door. I mean, we KNEW someone was coming in!

I should mention that each time we were about to enter a new section of the building, we heard an odd knocking sound coming from the other side of the wall. However, when we entered, the sound stopped and left no explanation. I’m not saying that we believe the place is haunted, but it’s a fact that we both heard the knocking, and neither of us could figure it out. These knocking sounds had already put us into a rather bewildered state, so when the garage door incident took place we were genuinely freaked out. Strange occurrences aside, the next sectional wall was waiting to be harassed. As it turned out, this wall ended our progress. I guess I’ll admit that we couldn’t get through, although I just realized that we didn’t check for panels. We were ready to leave anyway, so the exit process was set into motion at this time.


This was an odd situation. We actually had to scout for a way out! Leaving the same way we came in would take too long. GreyKat noticed that one of the giant doors looked slightly ajar. It had apparently been like this for a long time, because it was stuck pretty well. After jostling it a few times, it cracked open far enough for us to squeeze through.

As we walked away from the historic building, I thought about the door we exited through. What if it was the last door to be used by a mechanic as the repair center shut down for good so long ago? I imagined him leaving it slightly ajar, wondering if the building would still be standing in the 21st century, and if anyone would take the time to admire and appreciate it…