All articles tagged with #ghost town
A wildlife photographer spent 10 years capturing an elusive brown hyena in Namibia's abandoned Kolmanskop ghost town, resulting in an award-winning photo that highlights the species' rarity and ecological importance, while also emphasizing the need for conservation efforts.
Forest City, a Chinese-built mega-project in Malaysia, was intended to house one million people but currently only has a 1% occupancy rate. The isolated location, high prices, and lack of amenities have deterred potential tenants, earning it the nickname "Ghost City." The project's developer, Country Garden, faces significant debts and the challenges of China's property market crisis. Factors such as visa restrictions, political instability, and Covid-related travel restrictions have further hampered the project. The fate of Forest City and similar projects depends on the Chinese government's support, but the current situation highlights the gap between ambition and reality in China's property market.
Eerie photographs reveal the remains of California City, a planned metropolis that was intended to be the third-largest city in California but never came to fruition. The city, located in the Mojave Desert, was designed in the late 1950s with hopes of attracting 400,000 residents, but today it is home to only 15,000 people. The vast network of roads and named streets remain largely barren, with few houses or businesses developed. The failed project raises questions about the sustainability of building a water-rich city in the desert. Meanwhile, a group of Silicon Valley investors is planning to create a new utopian city in Solano County.
A luxury complex in Shenyang, China, known as the State Guest Mansions, has been reclaimed by local farmers after being abandoned by property giant Greenland Group. The development, which was planned as European-style villas, stands as a symbol of the excesses and corruption in China's housing market. The reasons for the project's failure remain unclear, but suspicions of official corruption have been raised. Ghost towns like this one now dot urban landscapes across China, as the government's crackdown on excessive borrowing and speculation has left several developers burdened with debt and facing flagging demand. Urban explorers are showing interest in these ghost towns, documenting their findings online.
A mystery buyer, Ecology Mountain Holdings, has purchased the property and mining claims of Eagle Mountain, a former iron-mining town in California, for roughly $22.5 million. The town served as a bustling company town for Kaiser Steel Mine until its closure in the 1980s. The buyer's plans for the vast property remain unclear. Eagle Mountain has remained uninhabited but not necessarily abandoned, and has served as a backdrop for Hollywood movies and music videos.
Fortnite has transformed from a straightforward multiplayer battle royale to a unique multimedia experience, with pop music having an audible presence in the game for years. Epic Games has taken its music licensing to an entirely new dimension, positioning Fortnite not just as a virtual billboard for promoting pop artists, but as its own kind of full-service streaming platform. The expansion of music licensing in Fortnite shows just how deeply embedded multiplayer gaming has become in pop culture, as the battle royale transforms from a straight-forward game concept to a massive streaming portal for media of all stripes.