With every passing year we are finding more and more abandoned houses along Ontario's back roads and farmlands. As cities grow and the need for improved infrastructure increases, our cities and towns encroach upon what was once vast farmland. Home builders, real estate companies and developers will buy out acres upon acres of land and sit on it, waiting for the need to build, waiting for the people to come and waiting for the growth.
But it's not just the home-builders and developers that are jumping on this land, the windmills that pepper the back-roads and cornfields of Ontario have claimed hundreds of houses. If that weren't enough, the 407 extension that is stretching east across the province has also claimed its fair share of homes.
Road expansion, schools, hospitals, condominiums and cookie cutter houses that are built with lightning speed, windmills and highways. As we try to keep up with a population boom and new Canadians who have left their counties for a new life in Canada topped with the need to travel and consume power -- we are consuming land and houses and history at an alarming pace.
Now, I am no expert in population growth -- I am not a city planner, I am certainly not one to speak to the reasons why we are experiencing such a rapid increase in the need for new large communities and why we need them built as fast as possible. I am a hobby photographer with a passion for shooting decay, and abandoned places and empty spaces.
Myself, along with many others, photograph the present state of the past by exploring the urban and rural outskirts of your cities and towns. Not alone in this hobby, we share a common passion with hundreds of weekend warriors who head for the back-roads every weekend with their DSLR cameras, iPhones and Android phones to capture these beautiful homes before they are demolished and replaced with new life, new families and a new future.
As we experience this growth an alarming number of homes are being left, literally in the dust. Some will be saved and given heritage status but most will be demolished. But it's not just the physical home that will be lost, inside these homes are memories, photographs and furniture. Some of these homes were built with elaborate staircases and hand carved newel posts, crown moulding, and decorative ceiling medallions.
Many of the images in this photo essay are from homes that are now demolished and these scenes will never be seen again. Some are still standing -- getting worse with each passing season, and there are many more out there to be discovered.
Here are 25 examples of Ontario's empty and abandoned spaces and some of the items that have been left behind.
This photo essay focuses on the abandoned houses in Ontario, equally as shocking are the amount of hospitals, factories and institutions all across the province that have been closed down and left vacant for many many different reasons.
To see more of my work and to see more of the abandoned places from all over Ontario and the North Eastern United States, you can visit www.freaktography.ca, or follow me on Facebook or on Instagram.
Thanks for reading, I hope you have enjoyed my work
- Freaktography