Fish & Chips are famed the world over as THE quintessential English food so why are there so many closed and abandoned “Chippies” in their home country?

American fish & chip shops have suffered a decline as well, especially fast food seafood restaurant chains like Arthur Treacher’s and H. Salt Esquire – both the chains and the affordable stocks of cod that sustained them are pale shadows of what they used to be. Family-run chippies linger on, however, though the once-charming Porto Restaurant in Edinburgh, Scotland’s seaside Portobello neighborhood is no longer them. Flickr users Dave Sinclair and Fabio Menna snapped the shop in long-abandoned and newly-abandoned states, respectively.

Dog’s Breakfast

One would hope “Helen” was able to retire from retail fish-frying with a modicum of grace when her self-titled chippie in Maidstone (a suburb of Melbourne) went belly-up. Then again, maybe Australians just aren’t that into fish & chips, what with all that “throw another shrimp on the barbie” stuff. Flickr user Warren Kirk (Westographer) captured the closed, abandoned, boarded-up and unlamented (save for a disappointed-looking dog) “Helen’s Fish ~ Chips” on a sunny December morning in 2011.

Parson’s Nose Best

As if a chippie on the High Street wasn’t Brit enough, the owners named the place “The New Parson’s Nose”… wonder what happened to the OLD one? Regardless, the sign on the window states the shop is “closed for refurbishment” and you know what that means: it’s gone like last night’s last pint of ale. Kudos to Flickr user leon S-D (littleweed1950) who snapped this pub-like former fish & chips shop in June of 2016.

Taken Away

“Over the last 40 years or so (in Australia at least) the traditional old style strip of shops in the suburbs has come under pressure from large shopping malls,” states urbex blogger David Taylor. Just wait, Dave, those large shopping malls have begun to feel a similar sort of pressure from online retailers. There’s nothing like the unique ambiance and the sit-sown dining experience of a classic Chippie, mind you. Taylor snapped the above faded Seafood Take Away in Mt Gravatt, a suburb of Brisbane.

Over, The Rainbow

Fish & Chips, Burgers, Southern Fried Chicken and so much more… how could Rainbow Spicy Kebabs, snapped in the summer of 2013 by Flickr user Robby Virus, possibly go under? Well, they COULD have prepared all of those things poorly, for one thing. It just goes to show you, a prime location in the heart of London offers no guarantee your fish & chips (& more) shop will achieve lasting success. Also, rainbows aren’t colored that way. Just sayin’.

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Battered 15 Closed And Abandoned Fish Chip Shops

War is over so can we give peace a chance? These abandoned British bomb stores and ammo bunkers are looking peaceful indeed now that the explosives are gone.

The Brits built up their military infrastructure explosively, pardon the pun, before and during the World Wars. Peacetime saw a corresponding deflation with hardened assets such as bomb stores typically abandoned instead of being dismantled.

One such quieted bomb store can be found at RAF Wittering near Peterborough in Cambridgeshire, England. Established in 1916 as an base for zeppelin-fighting BE2C and BE12 aircraft, the base was used by the USAAF in World War II and became the “Home of the Harrier” in the 1970s.

After the war, the base’s bomb stores were expanded and toughened to accommodate nuclear weapons. Flickr user Graeme Hutton (graemehutton) visited the disused and derelict bomb stores at the Wittering Ammo Dump in late July of 2014 and snapped dozens of evocative photos.

RAF Chilmark

RAF Chilmark in Wiltshire was built in 1936 and by 1965 it was the RAF’s only remaining ammunition supply depot. The base was shut down entirely in 1995 but it took the better part of two years to clear live ammunition from the site. Flickr user Newage2 visited the base’s bomb store in early February of 2016.

RAF Chilmark also houses a civil defense bunker built in 1985 and sold to private interests in 1997. In February of 2017, a police raid revealed the bunker had been converted to a large-scale marijuana grow-op. “There are approximately 20 rooms in the building, split over two floors, each 200 feet long and 70 feet wide,” stated Detective Inspector Paul Franklin of the Wiltshire Police Dedicated Crime Team. “Almost every single room had been converted for the wholesale production of cannabis plants, and there was a large amount of evidence of previous crops. This was an enormous set up.” Up in smoke, as they say.

RAF Newton

RAF Newton in Nottinghamshire was built in 1939 and closed in the year 2000. The site is gradually being converted into an industrial estate but not without controversy: radioactive contamination from Radium used to paint luminescent dials in the 1940’s has been detected. Flickr user Goldie87 visited disused parts of RAF Newton in late February of 2008.

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Boom To Busted Abandoned British Bomb Storage Depots

These 12 closed and abandoned bingo halls couldn’t compete with an increasing variety of online gaming options and the gradual spread of gambling casinos.

Down & Out In Dudley

Bingo can trace its history back to early 16th century Italy but the classic cards & numbers game really took off in the 1920s when its rules, format and equipment were standardized. Bingo boomed in Great Britain as well when, following the flight from movie theaters to in-home television in the 1950s, many newly-closed cinemas were converted to bingo halls.

The Hippodrome in Dudley, just northwest of the city of Birmingham, was one of these re-purposed silver screens. The 1,750-person capacity Hippodrome opened in 1938, closed (as a theater) in 1964, reopened as a bingo hall operated by Gala Bingo, and finally closed for good in 2009. Cheers to Flickr user Mikey Jones (donebythehandsofabrokenartist) for capturing the once-grand Hippodrome in its current (as of November 2010) sad state.

Punched Card

Bingo was (and still is) popular at traditional social gatherings held at and by churches so when the church is abandoned, so is the bingo. Credit Flickr user Forsaken Fotos for the evocative image above depicting a scattered remnant of fun times past from Brownsville, PA.

Odeon, Odeoff

When Bradford’s New Victoria cinema opened in 1930 it was the first such theater to be designed especially for showing “talkies”. The stately Renaissance Revival building underwent multiple changes in ownership over the next few decades until it was bought by Odeon Cinemas in the late 1960s. Odeon converted part of the building into the 1,000-seat Top Rank bingo hall, which shut its doors in the late 1990s. Credit Flickr user jST. with photographically capturing the abandoned bingo hall in mid-March of 2011.

Under The B: INGO

The photographer who snapped the image above didn’t give any details whatsoever on where the sign is located or what bingo hall it advertised – and the striking yet generic sign itself offers no clue either. Give Flickr user geo3pea credit, however, for bending over backwards (literally) to create an outstanding image that gives real perspective on the current state of the bingo “industry”.

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Punched Cards 12 Closed Abandoned Bingo Halls

Serving up American style with British flavor, hundreds of Little Chef roadside restaurants once warmed up the UK‘s motorways but less than 80 remain today.

“Once a familiar site by the roadside for greasy grub and indifferent service!,” according to Flickr user mad jeff, Little Chef was to the British Isles what Howard Johnson’s was to the USA – less the hotel rooms, swimming pools and fried clams. Founded in 1958 by Sam Alper, an entrepreneur admittedly influenced by America’s diners in the golden age of postwar road travel, Little Chef ballooned to 439 locations by the turn of the century… and you know what happens to balloons. The store above, located off the A1 motorway near Wansford, was one of the first Little Chef locations and stands (barely) today as a symbol of the once-robust chain’s astonishing slide into dereliction.

Kent Found On Roadside Dead

According to the brazenly optimistic Little Chef website, “we’ve grown to become one of the UK’s favourite roadside restaurants with 78 Little Chef restaurants from Scotland down to Cornwall.” 78 and counting… downward. Most pundits blame Little Chef’s inexorable death spiral on inconsistent ownership looking only to squeeze a few more pounds sterling out of the business before flipping it; a scenario that’s played out a jaw-dropping SEVEN times since the mid-1970s. The dreary images of an abandoned Little Chef located just off the A14 in Kentford, eastern England, come to us courtesy of Nosher.net who states, “discarded cassette tapes litter the area”. Nice.

Bypassed

Here’s a rather rough-looking abandoned Little Chef situated by the A46 Coventry by-pass near Binley Woods in Warwickshire. This store was one of a group of restaurants closed following the sale of the Little Chef chain to RCapital, a UK private equity group, in January of 2007. Kudos to Geograph member David Lally for documenting the state of the store in July of 2007 – one can only imagine what it looks like now assuming it hasn’t been bulldozed.

Sufferin’ In Suffolk

These evocative images of an abandoned Little Chef somewhere in Suffolk, eastern England were taken by Flickr user will2988 in May and June of 2013. Though originally modeled after classic diners and burger stands over the pond, Little Chef made efforts to appeal to the unique taste of domestic travelers with all-day breakfasts and traditional British fare such as bangers & beans with chips (fried potatoes) and even Ox Cheeks. Sorry, no Spam Eggs Sausage & Spam.

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Gruel Britannia 10 Abandoned Little Chef Restaurants

Urban explorers know that it isn’t typically the readily-visible locations that hold the most intrigue; it is the hidden places unknown to most of the world. The places that most of us will never visit (and may never even realize exist) are the most beautiful, interesting and worthy of our wonder. This particular hidden space sits beneath a man-made lake next to the massive estate of a late mining magnate…and even some of its closest neighbors have no idea it exists.

In the late 19th century, wealthy English businesspeople began to dot the countryside with extravagant homes. Not content to simply show off their wealth with mansions, however, they built accompanying towers and other displays that made the owners’ financial worth clear to all passers-by. Most of these displays served no practical purpose. Mining industry tycoon Whitaker Wright bucked the trend by creating a project that was invisible to all but those who were invited to enjoy it.

(image via: CyberGibbons)

Wright’s indulgence was an underwater billiards room and fish-watching conservatory built in the middle of a man-made lake on his property in Goldalming, Surrey. Accessed through a small wooden door, a spiral staircase and a short underwater tunnel boat ride, the room is well and truly secret to anyone who is not in the know. In fact, it has become something of a local legend; stories of the underwater room have been passed down through generations but many believe that the tales are pure fiction.

(images via: CyberGibbons)

After the property’s original owner was convicted of fraud, he killed himself with a cyanide capsule and Witley Park fell into the hands of Lord Pirrie, the builder of the ill-fated Titanic. Escaping death on his own creation thanks to an illness that kept him at home, Pirrie owned the home for around 15 years before his own death from pneumonia. Since then, Witley Park has been used as a conference center and meeting room, even after the original mansion burned down in 1952. The underwater billiards room has been accessible to many, but today it is blocked off and guarded with a security system.

(images via: CyberGibbons)

Still, some urban explorers have been able to gain access to this incredible secret room. In the photos above, the glass dome is lit from the inside, providing an eerie glow to the water and the statue that sits atop the dome. From inside the dome, the glass panes are nearly entirely obscured by sediment and algae, making it difficult to imagine how stunning the view once must have been.

(images via: CyberGibbons)

On the other hand, the decay and neglect that have changed the hidden rooms and tunnels have given them a wonderful sense of mystery. The fact that the underwater billiards room has been steeped in mystery for decades only serves to make it more fascinating. Sadly, the property’s current owner is not likely to give permission to explore the property today, but plenty of previous visitors have shared their photos online of this incredible place.

(Special thanks to Andrew for the use of his spectacular photos of Witley Park)