Creepiest, bleakest places you've ever been to

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Downtown Johannesberg - whoa - tall skyscrapers with windows blown out/covered by sheets with squatters living many stories up . .. looked super post-apocolyptic.

Just curious, what year were you there? There's been billions of dollars in rejuvenation over the past few years. Don't get me wrong, plenty of the CBD is still derelict and downright scary but huge swaths have been revitalized.

[Anonymous]

West Baltimore, MD. The areas off Route 1. Abandoned houses, drugged out zombies everywhere, open-air drug dealing. It's heartbreaking. One of my cousins got sucked into heroin addiction and I've spent way more time in that area than I care to admit. Area is downright horrifying on so many levels.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I grew up in a town in New England that had an abandoned mental institution in it. It was about the size of college campus, dozens of large brick abandoned buildings. Very creepy.

Norwich, CT?

NP. This is my hometown and I can’t believe there’s someone else who knows about that place!

Oh Honey. It's not a secret! https://opacity.us/site22_danvers_state_hospital.htm

This site will draw you in

You're right! I'm clicking through pictures and can't stop. Some of those places are mega-creepy!

Hometown poster. In college, I had to drive past this every day in the summer to get to my job. Let’s just say I only looked to the side when I had to do so.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Bleak and depressing: the Kenilworth area in DC right along 295. Every time I drive 295 I think how awful it must be to live there.

Every time I drive around there, it reminds me of my hometown, which is pretty bleak and depressing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The area around Notre Dame in Indiana. So flat. everything looks the same. Creepy as hell.

That area is weird but has one of the largest concentrations of Amish people in the country. Once you get off the highways it's like you've entered a different country.

[Anonymous]

Reviewing these choices, many of the locations listed are flat. Is there something creepier about a flat landscape? Maybe flatness accentuates vacant and abandoned buildings?

[Anonymous]

Murphy Village, SC. Irish Travellers live there, and it's truly bizarre. Huge McMansions with covered windows that appear unlived in, with trailers behind the houses where people actually reside. You definitely get the sense of being watched, because you are--I think they contact each other whenever there's a stranger cruising the neighborhood. If you drive around too long or too slow, they will follow you in big pickup trucks to intimidate you into leaving.

[Anonymous]

Manitou Springs, CO - cute little town ad the base of Pike's Peak. Weird, eery vibe, much occult activity there.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Youngstown, OH

Really depressing

Gary, IN is super scary too.

Yep, other Eastern Ohio town are bleek and the people creepy/sullen.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Beaver, PA. Creeptastic

I was going to say Beaver Falls, pa I am still haunted by the images of it decades later.

[Anonymous]

I'm from update NY (just outside smalbany) and I've seen several mentioned of larger cities in upstate like Albany and Schenectady, but both these places have some really nice areas to them. I saw Troy mentioned, and while I think its a better choice, I still think something like Cohoes or Waterviliet are better candidates for "bleak" places.

[Anonymous]

Rural southern Alabama has many old vacant antebellum homes that are so creepy to look at, even in the day time. The state actually has alot of abandoned old houses, and they always creep me out when I drive through there to visit family. Tuskegee in particular is fairly bleak.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Murphy Village, SC. Irish Travellers live there, and it's truly bizarre. Huge McMansions with covered windows that appear unlived in, with trailers behind the houses where people actually reside. You definitely get the sense of being watched, because you are--I think they contact each other whenever there's a stranger cruising the neighborhood. If you drive around too long or too slow, they will follow you in big pickup trucks to intimidate you into leaving.

I don’t get it. Who built the McMansions and why? What do they do with the McMansions? What’s the point of being a Traveller (what my grandmother called a tinker?) if you’re living behind a mcmansion? That honestly sounds like the worst of both worlds. All the tacky boredom of suburbia, but without the closet space or water pressure.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Reviewing these choices, many of the locations listed are flat. Is there something creepier about a flat landscape? Maybe flatness accentuates vacant and abandoned buildings?

Appalachia, including central PA and upstate NY, Idaho, NM...Creepiness can be anywhere. A lot has to do with economics.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:toledo, ohio

I was once menaced in the parking lot of the krogers, just for having michigan plates. And it was the Krogers on the nice side of town!