05/08/06 - Roosevelt Warehouse aka. Detroit Public School Warehouse
Donnie & I headed over to the U.S. for some exploration of Detroit. Our goal wasn't the DPS Warehouse, but I pointed it out when our original plan failed. What I thought was just a somewhat interesting building online, turned into quite the entertaining facility.
Located on 14th Street, right next to the all encompassing train station; you have the Detroit Public School Warehouse. The warehouse was once owned by the Detroit Public School system, but after a fire engulfed part of the building in the 80's it was sold in a "as-is" sale.
Now the building is owned by the same man who owns the train station and the bridge (R.R. Morend, I believe?); and this building has been awaiting demolishing since 1997.
Source: Metro Times Article
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Through a rolled
up fence we approached through the loading dock. Once inside, you come
over quite a sight...crates upon crates of all kinds of school supplies for as
far as the eye can see.
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In some places
the piles of papers and books reached 7 or 8 feet.
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Various school
supplies littered the second floor...such as footballs...
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stationary...
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library cards...
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And where there
was one school supply, there would be crates upon crates of that supply.
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Canada Maps...
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Large Geography
Pull Down Maps...
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On the 3rd floor
there was a very large area of textbooks...
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Old school
textbooks...
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Carbon Paper...
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Stoppers for
beakers...
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Chemicals for
Science Class...The Fondeler was about to take one home, then I pointed out to
him that it may not be the best idea to take home a white powdery substance that
you have no clue what it is...he threw it out.
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Martin Luther
King Jr. Pamphlets...
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Dated
newspapers...
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Maybe the papers
were the property of Bessie Gorman or Roberta Burton, because they seemed to be
interested in Negro History...
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Dated newspaper
prices...$0.49 potato chip box?
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Well once we
reached the 4th floor, it began to look strange because there was a large amount
of light and vegetation.
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Once we moved
into the 4th floor some more, we found that part of a raised roof had collapsed
and trees and mosses were growing in the enclosed area.
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Quite large
trees.
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Another shot of
the vegetation.
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I was telling a
woman I worked with about this building and she was curious as to how trees
could grow on the 4th floor of an abandoned building; so I shot this picture of
the largest tree's roots. In the background you can see the collapsed
concrete slab that encompassed the roof.
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Also on the 4th
floor there was areas with drainage pipes that were now missing. The rain &
light coming through the empty hole made for a good picture in Donnie & my rainy
visit.
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Also on the 4th
floor were some ravaged office areas.
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Some had such a
steady amount of water pouring into them, that moss began to develop.
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Donnie in a
office room of printing presses and book binding machines...
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Once we reached
the roof we found the collapsed portion of the roof where trees were emerging
from the warped metal supports.
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The other roof that twinned the collapsed portion wasn't looking so well.
I don't have a
lens on my camera; that's all from the metal bending under the pressure of the
concrete roof.
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Also it's
understandable how trees formed on the 4th floor after seeing the roof that
wasn't collapsed having grasses and soil located atop.
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The other
interesting item of the roof was the train station simply dwarfing our building
and still having such enormity even with us 40 feet above the ground.
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Donnie & I went on a Tuesday and The Fondeler wanted to go back on the weekend.
When I went back
with The Fondeler, we heard someone yelling at us and realized that they were
people atop the train station. It was quite amusing to be
yelling my cell phone number at full volume from rooftop to rooftop.
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People enjoying the train station.
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