There’s a quiet sense of foreboding permeating this series of black and white photos of old uranium mining towns and nuclear test sites throughout the West, captured by Australian-American photographer Brett Leigh Dicks. The images depict scenes that once held enormous potential: first for progress, then for danger and destruction. Now they’re just empty. “Atomic Alchemy: Nuclear Landscapes Across the American West” explores how these sites scattered across Utah, Idaho, Arizona and New Mexico rose and fell along with public perception of nuclear power in the early stages of its development and post World War II, after the bombings in Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

“The United States Atomic Energy Commission predicted that, by the turn of the 21st century, one thousand reactors would be producing electricity for homes and businesses across the U.S.,” reads Dicks’ artist statement. “The reality was far short of what was promised, as nuclear technology produced a range of problems… not to mention the unresolved difficulties of site decommissioning and water disposal.”

Missile launch centers, uranium mines, atomic bomb loading pits and infamous sites like the Enola Gay Hanger in Utah and the Trinity Test Site in New Mexico are pictured as they stand today in their quiet desert environments. Many are little more than roadside curiosities; the heaviness of their history lingers in the air despite their current state of stillness. Dicks sees them as “an eerie testament to a period of time that was meant to revolutionize civilization.”

The photographer says his primary area of interest “investigates the landscape and the fragile ties that it shares with social progress adn historical significance,” and his previous projects include “explorations of abandoned military complexes, decommissioned prisons, walls constructed from socio-political divides and nuclear landscapes.” Check out more of his work at BrettLeighDicks.com.

When coal mines get the shaft, only abandoned winding towers remain to mark the places where Earth’s underground bounty was winched to the surface.

Coal and metal ores are finite resources, the extraction of which requires a huge investment in machinery and infrastructure. When a site’s prime resource runs out, however, it often isn’t economically viable to move the massive infrastructure to a new location.

Such was the case at the Winterslag coal mine in northeastern Belgium, which opened in 1917 and closed in 1988. Flickr user Geoffrey Alfano (Geoffrey Vlassaks) visited the complex in June of 2011, subsequently posting a host of evocative HDR images.

The mine’s quarry, slag dumps, factory buildings and matching pair of winding towers have all been “recultivated” and preserved in recent years, with additional construction resulting in a unique tourist attraction: the C-MINE cultural center.

Super Yooper

Old iron mines need love (and winding towers) too. The Cliffs Shaft Mine complex (now a museum) in Ishpeming on Michigan’s rugged Upper Peninsula operated from 1868 through 1967, and in 1992 it was added to the National Register of Historic Places. The abandoned mine’s oldest winding towers date from 1919 and were built in the Egyptian Revival style. Like many actual ancient Egyptian monuments, this 97-foot tall tower still looks impressive today.

Polish Precedent

Flickr user Rafal Nalepa (Rafal N.) visited the Prezydent coal mine in Chorzów, Poland back in October of 2010 and came back with a wealth of striking images of this former Silesian coal mine and its surprisingly stylish winding tower.

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Shafted 10 Eerie Unused Abandoned Mine Winding Towers

Abandoned subterranean pits once used to mine everything from gold to salt have been reclaimed as theme parks, restorative spas for asthmatics, data centers, cathedrals and even the world’s largest underground bike park. These 12 projects reclaim disused mines both above and below the surface of the earth, restoring communities devastated by strip mining and making smart use of the secure, insulating properties of subterranean spaces.

Mega-Cavern Bike Park, Kentucky

A former limestone mine 100 feet below the surface of Louisville, Kentucky is now the world’s largest underground bike park at 320,000 square feet. The Mega Underground Bike Park maintains a steady temperature around 60 degrees year-round and features over 45 trails marked for different skills and styles.

Salt Mines to Subterranean Theme Park, Romania

You’ll feel like you’re accessing another world altogether when you ride an elevator nearly 400 feet to the bottom of an old salt mine in Romania, exiting to take in strange architectural shapes set on black bodies of water, dotted with surreal LED lighting and surrounded by soaring cave walls. First excavated in the 17th century, the Turda Salt Mines feature a playground, ferris wheel, mini golf course, sports arena, amphitheater and bowling lanes in addition to views of the restored mining equipment and the cavern itself.

World’s Largest Underground Trampoline in a Slate Mine, Wales

Children and adults alike bounce gleefully upon trampolines suspended from a Welsh slate quarry mining cavern twice the size of St. Paul’s Cathedral. ‘Bounce Below’ is the world’s largest underground trampoline, with a system of bouncy surfaces strung from the walls ascending between 20 and 180 feet from the cavern floor. Ten-foot net walls keep everyone from bouncing right out.

Limestone Mine to Data Center, Kansas City, Missouri

The SubTropolis Technology Center in Kansas City, Missouri is a limestone mine converted to an underground data center, where the limestone walls act as insulation, absorb heat from the equipment and provide natural security. Making use of this existing space saved 3-6 months of construction work; the walls were left raw and very little above-ground architecture was required.

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Rocky Ruins Reclaimed Mining Facilities Transformed

Built in the late 1970s, this mining village housed 1,200 people at its peak and was left effectively intact for over twenty years before being sold as a whole for $5,000,000 to an entrepreneur in 2004 who has worked on bring it back to life in the decade since. He has, however, had to adjust his plans to the market along the way – his latest endeavor: to revive it to fit its original purpose once more (image above by Andrea B).

Located in northern British Columbia, Kitsault boasts a remarkable lack of decay, its infrastructure still mostly intact. It has over 100 houses and apartment buildings as well as a movie theater, hospital, shopping mall, recreation center and swimming pool.

Krishnan Suthanthiran purchased the town with visions of turning it into a rural retreat for the creative class and has already spent over $10,000,000 repairing landscapes and fixing buildings.

Still, much more work would have been required had the relocation of its previous occupants not been so hasty – they were moved almost overnight in the early 1980s, leaving almost everything intact behind them. Indeed, many of the spaces come complete with vintage furniture and decor dating back to the abandonment of the town.

The idea has evolved over time, however, as commodities markets have rebounded – this time liquid natural gas may be the key to the area’s success. In the end, Kitsault could once again become what it was to begin with: a mining town.

No hoax, it is happening  – 20,000 occupants of Kiruna, Sweden, are being forced to pull up stakes and relocate their entire urban center to avoid having it fall off the face of the Earth.

The existing settlement is situated alongside a vast mine that fuels the local economy, but which also responsible for the huge fissures snaking their way toward the heart of the city. As the miners dig deeper, an increasing area of ground is threatened with collapse – at least 3,000 buildings are not expected to survive. Starting immediately, a multi-year effort is underway to shift everything away from the danger zone.

Relocating a whole urban populace is no small feat. As reported by the BBC, “The number of people involved in a project of this scale exceeds the thousands and includes city planners, architects, landscape designers, biologists, urban designers, civil engineers, demolition and construction experts and builders, as well as social anthropologists.” In some cases, whole buildings (like a century-old church) will be deconstructed, moved and reassembled on new sites.

The pressure has been building for some time with citizens having to make difficult decisions about buying real estate and building businesses with this growing threat looming in the backs of their minds. In a way, the definitive decision to break ground on a new town center is a relief to the population, who can now plan their lives around a new known reality. In some ways, too, it is a chance to start over – to build a city from scratch with lessons learned from the existing layout.

Still, there are many questions without clear answers, including: how does the city evaluate the parcels held by existing landowners who have to move, be they residents or business owners? “The Stockholm-based architects White Arkitekter AB, which won the contract to design the new Kiruna, envisages a denser city centre with a greater focus on sustainability, pedestrians and public transport than automobiles.” With a freshly-constructed center, one thing is certain: everything will change – the focal point for the entire built environment of the region is shifting and the future of the city remains uncertain.