The Concrete City

In the summer of 2016 a friend and I made the first of what we hope will be an annual road trip / adventure tour to another state. For this year's trip we chose the state of Pennsylvania, and for the first part of this trip we stopped at the Concrete City of Nanticoke.
         
Imagine a neighborhood of 22 duplex buildings spread out in somewhat of a circle, almost like a giant cul-de-sac. Next, imagine that each of these buildings is made entirely of concrete. Finally, imagine that this neighborhood has been abandoned for nearly 100 years and is being overtaken by the forest. This is the Concrete City of Nanticoke.

If it weren't for our GPS coordinates I'm not sure we even would have found the place. We were looking for a neighborhood therefore we assumed we should be looking for some sort of road entrance. But when we stopped the car where our coordinates said we should we found ourselves directly across from these trails.

Up the trail we went, and after maybe a quarter mile bike ride (which included one wrong turn that nearly landed us in someone's backyard) we found the first of our buildings. That feeling of wonderment I got coming across something so seemingly out of place is something everyone should experience at least once in their life.

There is not a window or door left in any of the buildings, just openings, so we had no issue getting inside and exploring them.

In fact, some buildings even had extra windows where kids had broken through walls.

As can be expected in a place like this, each building was covered with graffiti both inside and out. I have mixed feelings about that. I'm no fan of vandalizing, but I found myself taking pictures of some of the more eye-catching work.

On the other hand, the place had more than its share of garbage from people like this genius. I was happy not to run into him during any of our travels.

Built as company housing for a local a coal company, these days Concrete City is used for police training as well as paintball & pellet gun wars. One of our goals was to climb onto the roof of a building, and it was up there that I found evidence of this latter activity. Fortunately, this is just a toy :)

Being built out of concrete is what eventually caused the abandonment of these buildings, as the community was built without plumbing and not easily adaptable to the installation of it. Being built out of concrete is also the reason they remain standing nearly 100 years after being deserted, rather than being demolished. They tried - dynamite was used in the attempted destruction of one building - but because they are so sturdy very little damage was done and the idea was given up on.

And so fortunately for people like myself, here they remain.