GE Power Plänt

Fitchbürg, Massachüsetts

Fall 2007.

This past summer I began to explore more with Detroit explorers and even came to know some out of towners. This led me to join a worldwide forum which had a meet up this past fall.

This meet up was during a time where I still didn't really talk to anyone in Nova Scotia. Since I knew that good people would be at the meet up, I decided to drive 10 hours from Nova Scotia down to Massachusetts.

The drive was quite uneventful. Away from a Maine gas attendant giving me extra money during a currency exchange (this was back when the US Dollar was still greater than the Canadian Dollar) not too much happened. We were supposed to get a grip of campsites by each other in Massachusetts; but I never got one because I figured that I wouldn't get there early enough on Friday night.

Sure enough, I didn't get down to North Andover until around 3a.m. I found a parking lot and got as comfortable as I could in the back of the old car.

After sleeping for a solid 3 or 4 hours, I made my way over to the campground so that I could get some real sleep in my tent.

And sure enough, the campground didn't start registration until noon. So I parked my car in front of the campground and tried to catch a few more hours of sleep.

The campground eventually opened and I made my way inside. The campground was quite stunning and I found it weird because the area surrounding it was quite bustling and then you just had this gem of a campground.

There was no one around the grouping of campsites that we had - but I was too tired to care. I set up my tent and caught some much needed, quality sleep.

A couple of hours passed and I decided to finally get up and figure out what the heck was going on.

By sure chance, I spotted GrayFox walking about and went over and we conversed.

Apparently, the group was really drunk the night before and was ejected from the campground. I thought maybe I had drove 10 hours for nothing; but GrayFox said that they (he and Navi276(yeah, there's a female Navi too)) we're headed over to the Fitchburg power plant right now.

Excellent! We also ran into Arntzville and we all hopped in his car and headed on our way to Fitchburg.

Fitchburg is a city located 50 miles west of Boston. Once a well-off, blue collar city; the 1998 closure of the GE Power Plant has led the city into quite the decline. Where the downtown used to bustle and was amongst the safest places in Massachusetts - it now is home to many vacant storefronts, homeless, trash and crime. The 600 jobs lost combined with the 1400 lost in the closure of a local military institution crippled poor Fitchburg. Where hard working citizens once rented houses; drug dealers and users began occupancy because of the poor tenancy, falling rent costs and the proximity to Boston. Fitchburg suddenly became a significant place in the American drug trade. Quite a bit of drugs coming in off the Atlantic would go to Fitchburg because of its geographical location. Even drugs trafficked from Mexico have been found en route to Fitchburg.

It's funny because GrayFox was talking about how bad Fitchburg was, and I was just laughing because the place seemed fine. I was in Massachusetts. Am I supposed to be scared? This wasn't Cinncinnati, this wasn't Flint...it was Fitchburg, Massachusetts.

Anyway, enough of the socio-economics of Fitchburg...a power plant closed 9 years ago and crippled the community - but it did attract 3 area explorers and a Canadian.

This was the first time that I had visited anyone to explore. I was brought to a location, instructed how to get inside and went through the facility. C'est la vie.

If anything, power plants are probably my favorite type of abandonment and after a 10 hour drive, it was ideal that I was rewarded with one. Fitchburg GE was pretty good; although my enthusiasm was a bit tempered by the rad one that I had just been inside, months earlier in Ohio.

We spent about 3 hours inside until night began to fall. We ate some Dunkin' Donuts on the mean streets of Fitchburg and headed back to the campground (about an hour drive).

Navi.

Back to Main.