Abandoned Train yard, Budapest

 Istvantelek

Between a trip and another, I started an urban photography project in Budapest, where I live, and in Hungary, I am visiting abandoned places and have a shooting with a model. Recently I exported this project also outside Hungary, in the summer of 2021 I lived two months in Kyrgyzstan and had this project also there.

I want to say that it's illegal and very dangerous to enter abandoned buildings/places, so please don't take this post as an invitation to do the same.

One of the first places I visited with this project is the Istvantelek train yard, which once was one of the most important railway vehicle repair shops in Hungary, the Hungarian railway history park is located near the area.

I like to discover and visit abandoned places because they are full of history, they are like an open exhibition of a recent past, when I'm there I'm imagining people that interacted with that place, that worked there, how was their life in that period.

If it is possible I always explore the place before the shooting, so I go to the abandoned area twice. I do it for several reasons, one is to see the place and get some pictures to show to the model and decide together the mood of the shooting, another is to understand if it is easy to access it, I don't want to put the model in a difficult or dangerous situation. 

The workshop was built at the beginning of the 20th century, only a few southern parts of the train yard are still in use, while most of it is abandoned. 

Enter the train yard was not difficult, and because near it there are working areas we decided to go there on Sunday, so there are fewer people that can see us.

Outside the deposit there are a few abandoned trains, the above pictures are from these ones, and are also the first part of the shooting where usually we are trying to get the mood and the atmosphere of it.

Inside the deposit, there are several trains, some of them really old like a steam locomotive from the Soviet period with a red star in front. In this second part, I already had a clear idea of what I wanted, for example, the two pictures after the black and white one, I had them in my mind before the shooting because I loved them from the first time I saw them that seat near the window.

This area had its most important role during the first world war, and in between the first world war and the second, but during the second it suffered more severe damage from bomb attacks. After the war, its role decreased with the displacement of steam locomotives.

In the 80s the stream plant in Hungary came to an end and the yard role came to an end permanently, as I said, in the main workshop area there are many railway steam locomotives in poor condition, these are stored in disused halls and outdoors, in contrast with the neighbouring railway park, because there is no financial support for their maintenance.

We passed around three hours here for the shooting, we didn't realize the time was passing because we had a lot of fun and I have to say I love this place, it is really fascinating. At the rear end of the shooting we meet a security guard that asked us what we were doing there, fortunately, we didn't have problems because it was enough to say that we didn't know where we were and left the place.

I have already other abandoned places on my list to visit, and some of them I will try to write about if this post is successful, so please write down a comment and tell me your opinion.