The Sweet Smell of Decay

I guess it’s really easy to get used to the idea of nothing being around forever; to quietly accept that we live in an encompassing mindset of transition and impermanence. We readily and consciously design and anticipate throwing things away, resigned to the non-negotiable fact that nothing man-made endures longer than absolutely necessary in order to fulfill whatever short-sighted purpose we may have had for it. This concept of planned disposability intrigues me. I was once a student of architecture; impressed and inspired by the beauty and expression of mechanical and artistic creation. I am still awed by the soaring cathedrals and intricate stonework of ancient masons that endures to this day in many parts of Europe and the “older” places of this world, but I am equally interested in the North American mindset, where obscene amounts of money are spent to erect towering edifices of steel and glass that will have a lifespan of maybe sixty years – much less than the average human being.

I’ve been scraping along the jagged edges of this post for a better part of a year. The thought process began around the same time I became interested in urban exploration, or UE. For those of you out there who are unfamiliar with the term, UE involves “exploring” urban structures such as abandoned buildings, storm drains, utility tunnels, construction sites, and those dark, forgotten recesses of the city that people have either forgotten about or really just don’t want to remember. It is a gritty, secretive, dangerous, and misunderstood activity. More often than not, it involves an element of lawlessness, as regardless of the fact that these locations have been abandoned and left to crumble, more often than not they do belong to someone and that someone usually is not wild about the idea of people poking around in their unattended and probably quite hazardous private property. What really piqued my curiousity about all this was the fairly rigid code of ethics that most serious urban explorers live by. Though technically they are trespassers, they are not petty criminals looking for a thrill by breaking and entering. They do not steal, they do not destroy. They do not “tag”, or leave graffiti. They are there simply to discover and to observe; and many of the things that they see are disturbing, nostalgic, or truly magnificent.

I am a firm believer that buildings, inanimate objects though they might be, have personalities all their own. Some are good, most are fairly neutral, and some make you want to run screaming into the night. I have stood in places that made my skin crawl; felt irrational fears and feelings that truly can not be explained, and have instantly felt comfortable and at home in places that I had never been before in my life. I have often wondered if it is possible for buildings to gradually absorb bits and pieces of the lives and events that play out within their walls, and to retain those feelings and share them with anyone in tune enough to listen. If so, perhaps some buildings speak louder than others.

Shortly after becoming interested in UE, I discovered several web resources dedicated to the Buffalo Central Terminal. This building nearly leaped off the page at me the first time I saw it. I began to research its history and learned more about its former glory and tragic descent into dereliction. Constructed during the heyday of passenger rail travel, it boasted a throughput capacity of 3200 passengers per hour, or 200 trains per day. As passenger train service began to decline, so did the fortunes of the terminal; until it was finally formally abandoned in 1977. The only reason it still stands today is that the city of Buffalo’s tenuous financial situation does not permit the expenditure of the estimated $12 million USD that would be required to raze the terminal and its surrounding buildings. The building itself is striking; a monolithic art deco landmark that dominates the surrounding area. The interior was once spectacular, and now is so overcome by the ravages of time and the elements that it was recently used as the setting for a horror movie. From the moment I learned of it, something about this building called to me. Even though it is half a continent away and there is every possibility that I will never see it in my lifetime, I still feel strangely drawn to it. As I looked at the photos of the precarious, rusting walkways and crumbling walls that were traversed by the individuals exploring the building, it became quite apparent that touring the Buffalo Central Terminal would entail quite literally risking one’s life. I was surprised then, to feel strangely like I understood the motivation for doing it. The building is so dilapidated that it is truly frightening; almost sinister. It is only when one looks closer and begins to see beyond the grime and decay that masks the once-proud pieces of yesterday that the building begins to tell a story. It is a story of progress and technology; of society and its evolution. It is illustrated by faded, cracking paint chips, and carved stone letters now devoid of their gold leaf definition. It is told by an empty newspaper stand that will never sell another newspaper, and by the empty pedestal that once held a magnificent statue of a Buffalo, welcoming travelers from far off destinations to its namesake city. Filtered through stained and broken windows, the light plays across these things and paints them with a mood that is all at once ominous, thought-provoking, and beautiful. There is something in the ruined shell of this building that refuses to be forgotten. It is a microcosm of an urban life cycle; both an inspiration and a grim warning.

Although my involvement with UE has been mostly from the sidelines, I still find it interesting to follow along with these adventures from behind my computer screen, amazed at some of the places these guys have been. Some of these buildings have tremendous histories; interesting, mysterious, and sometimes violent and bloody. Exploring them seems to be a way to touch on that past, and maybe to learn something from it. It is a way of finding beauty in decline and even death; of assuring oneself that although nothing lasts forever, it doesn’t need to be forgotten either.

It kind of hit home for me last night when I was standing in the parking lot of West Edmonton Mall. Once the largest shopping mall in the world, I am still amazed at its size and scale. I can remember as a wide-eyed 14 year-old, stepping under the loops of the roller coaster and trying to summon the courage required for a ride on the “Drop of Doom”. I remember spending all night wandering through the seemingly endless corridors of that mall and still not seeing it all. I remember how new everything seemed; how shiny and new and impressive it was. Last night, as I was leaving the mall, I stopped to watch a kids’ hockey game being played on the rink near the east entrance. I can’t remember what it was that drew my eyes upwards, but I was surprised to find the painted trim underneath the glass dome overhead to be discoloured and showing the telltale greasy-looking spots that are the early signs of mold. At first it didn’t really register, but as I walked out to my car I began to notice more indications of disrepair. The concrete detail work on many of the fountains was chipped and broken, even if only slightly. The faux-marble floor looked worn and tired, and there were long and evil-looking rust streaks streaming down the once-immaculate glass canopies over the main entrances. As I reached the car, I noted that many of the lighted signs on the mall’s exterior were partially burned out or were missing letters. The sign for the Bay looked as though it were disintegrating from the inside; its dirty yellow letters streaked with grime and flickering softly. West Edmonton Mall, the glowing temple of commerce I remember from my youth, is rotting.

The drive back to the hotel seemed longer than it actually was, because something about the mall’s decline really disturbed me. It felt almost like someone I knew had fallen sick, and for some reason I knew that they would not recover. Images of the Buffalo Central Terminal came to my mind, and I began to imagine what the mall might look like some years from now when the price of oil crashes and interest rates bankrupt those of us who are currently riding the wave of the boom and living well beyond our means. I could see the lagoon around the pirate ship, long drained of any water and populated only by the peeling paint of the concrete coral formations and a few rusting scraps of metal that used to be the guide rail for the submarines. I could picture the dry, discoloured recess what was once the wave pool, the glass overhead dome dirty and broken in several places, no longer shielding the cracked tiles of the former pool deck from the elements. I could imagine the cavernous expanse of what used to be the amusement park; the concrete floor cracked, broken, and punctuated only with rusting bolts protruding from footings that once anchored some of the most spectacular rides in the country. The Mall itself would have become nothing more that a rotten shell; its once brilliant corridors and storefronts now subject to the elements and at the mercy of the vandals and vagrants that would easily penetrate the crumbling exterior walls.

I wonder if it will ever come to that. Thinking about it conjures up images of a Mad-Max type, post-apocalyptic society, but in many ways it really isn’t that much of a stretch. In many ways, society is already in decline. From a physical perspective, it only makes sense that we will take our monuments down with us. The only real question to be asked is what will we learn from it? What will the urban explorers of tomorrow think as they are picking their way through the wreckage of what was once the mightiest shopping mall on the planet? Will they mourn? Shake their heads in disgust? It is a question with an answer that only somewhere like the Buffalo Central Terminal knows.