Usine

Hochelaga-Maisonneuve has been deeply marked by the train, in its development. Even today, it is surrounded by three tracks : the Canadian Pacific to the west, the now abandoned Canadian National to the east and the one of the port of Montreal to the south.

For the longest part of the 20th century, it was also bordered to the north by the «shop Angus», a vast industrial complex occupying 40 acres of land as well as the «Montreal Locomotive Works», a provider of the CPR, to the east, both now vanished.

In the Basque Country there are several generations who have grown up by drinking milk from the Beyena company, a regional source of pride, well beyond its nutritional values. Every day, hundreds of trucks were leaving the factory located in Bilbao with their precious cargo of a wide variety of dairy products to serve the region.

The company is described as a strong and everlasting business. Yet, the new millennium has shot down Beyena. In May 2000, after a decade of turmoil, the last workers are thanked and the plant is abandoned.

The history of the Babcock & Wilcox in the Galindo valley began during the First World War when the difficulties of the Compañía de los Caminos de Hierro del Norte de España will result in the sale of the plant to the Babcock & Wilcox company, today specializing in energy technologies.

The place is big, very big. While the building is nearly 200,000 square feet, the site, meanwhile, is over than 430,000 square feet in an agricultural area of Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu. For those interested, the site is for sale and the current owner requires more than $ 400,000 for it. "Ideal for businesses specialized in transport and storage," says the announcement. The structure collapsed in several places and the prospective buyer is better to be clever with renovation tools, if you want my opinion.

When I was a kid, I often traveled with my parents and my brothers in Los Santos, the village where I was born. Each time when we approached, my father used to say: "Beware, I will give a penny to the first one who will see the smoke of the plant." That was until 1973 before the closure of the factory, ie, seventeen years after its inauguration.

The sole purpose of its creation in 1956 was to provide cement to all work to improve the region's infrastructure such as dams, roads, construction of dozens of new villages. This project was called the Badajoz plan.

Built in 1921 on the left bank of the Deule in Marquette-Lez-Lille (north of the France), the majestic Grands Moulins de Paris's mill is a huge structure adrift waiting for a renaissance that is pending since few decades.

The history of this factory starts at the turn of the twentieth century. It was in 1920 that will grouped several millers in order to build this imposing 25,000 m² building. This Neo-Flemish style building is described as a modern success at the cutting edge of technology at the time. Its architecture would reflect the northern region.

From the outside, there is no indication that the plant is abandoned. No window is doomed and there is no "for sale" sign. Even the structure of the building is still in very good condition. I myself had doubts when I heard about it for the first time. The info came from an urbexer who invited me to join him and his friend. Knowing these two photographers by their (very good) reputation, I could not refuse this invitation!

Destroyed in 2004, the Terken brewery was a huge industrial complex of more than four hectares. Located in the Union area in Roubaix, near Lille, the factory was, at one time, a symbol of "close symbiosis" between the company and its community through football clubs who wore its colors and customers service. With a history of over 80 years, it was at its peak, the largest independent brewery in France.

Sold for $ 1 in 2004 in exchange of the promise to clean up the heavily polluted soil, the land of more than 3.5 million square feet has not found its commercial and residential purpose promised by March Group, the current owner. However, when Alstom has closed this plant in 2003, several projects have been proposed for this impressive site. In 2005, there was a project about a fair center in connection with the relocation of the Montreal Casino to the Peel Basin. However, with the outcry from neighborhood residents, the project has been abandoned.

The plant itself is definitively not as great at we saw in other places. Located in the heart of Pointe-Saint-Charles neighborhood of Montreal, this two storey building has no longer the cachet of its heyday. While neighboring buildings are gradually revamped to accommodate them new condo owners, nothing seems to have changed over here. Nature has reasserted itself in the courtyard with all these trees, aged of dozen years old.