Category Archive for ‘Photographs’ at Digital Geography

Archive for the 'Photographs' Category

The value of brownfield sites: Hams Hall control room

Published

on February 18, 2010

in 3D visualization, Participatory geographies, Photographs and Public geographies

. Closed

Developing brownfield sites is generally held to be a “good” thing (at least GCSE students are programmed to think so), however at times it’s worth considering that buildings such as power stations represent a substantial part of our industrial heritage. Hams Hall was a series of three coal-fired power stations at Lea Marston in Warwickshire, constructed between 1928 and 1968. Demolition of the last of the stations took place under cover of darkness in 1993

photo Wikipedia transferred from Geograph. Copyright Tim Marshall

The only building that survives is the control room of Hams Hall substation. The exterior is vaguely reminiscent of a mosque, though guarded with razor wire and liberal coatings of anti-climb paint. Indeed on my first visit, late on a stormy November night, the place was less than welcoming, and I failed to get inside.

Thanks to information from some helpful locals, I was able to return for a closer look. I knew what to expect; a circular control room with an extraordinary glass “flower” roof.

I planned to make a 360 degree image to show the room properly. The floor is covered in glass and it’s extremely dark inside, meaning that the exposures had to be lit with a torch. Here’s the finished panorama on 360 Cities:

Hams Hall substation control room in England

I’ve published the image as a full screen, high quality panorama on a personal page as well, since 360 Cities is getting a little cluttered . Click the image below:

Decrepit old buildings can hide all kinds of fascinating secrets. I don’t believe this building is protected in any way, although it is very well sealed up. Maybe it should be listed? Either way, it’s an important part of the local built environment, and a pretty special place. Perhaps we should get students to think more critically about the value of certain brownfield sites? The substation would make a really great local studies classroom, or some other kind of publicly-accessible building, where the unique roof and control panels could be protected from further damage.

secret geographies

Published

Noel Jenkins

on January 17, 2010

in Participatory geographies, Photographs, Public geographies and Teaching resources

. Closed

Since August, I’ve pushed blogging and other forms of time-wasting activities firmly to one side and dedicated myself to a series of adventures in hidden places. Every weekend has been a new experience, learning new skills and going deeper and further into the hidden parts of the built environment that surrounds us. It’s a simple, yet hugely fulfilling activity, filled with remarkable characters and stories, risks and rewards. This Flickr River stream randomly serves up a taster of some of the places I’ve been:

The hobby has benefited both History and Geography lessons. This weekend we visited a hidden deep shelter, built to house 2,500 people during WW2. It was a surreal time walk:

I made this video for a local teacher (I had the song going around my head while exploring the shelter) Others might also find it useful:

NGTE Pyestock slideshow

Published

Noel Jenkins

on October 11, 2009

in Photographs and Public geographies

. Closed

This is a huge brownfield site near Fleet in Hampshire. Owned by the government, the National Gas Turbine Establishment facility was used to test jet engines until decommissioning a few years ago. The machinery and buildings are unique, but following the inevitable planning arguments, Tesco’s will be converting this extraordinary example of our industrial heritage into a warehouse distribution centre.

I’m delivering some INSET courses coming up in the next few weeks, which is the reason why there haven’t been any posts here for a while. I’m hoping to manage a few surprises!

hidden places – ROC posts (guest writer)

Published

Noel Jenkins

on August 27, 2009

in Photographs

. 1 Comment

Today my dad and I went on adventure. We were historian explorers for a day and we visited a Royal Observer Corps post. ROC posts are bunkers underneath the ground used during the Cold War; they are just like bomb shelters in World War Two. Here is some more information. The ROC post’s usually occur in the middle of isolated fields, they have barbed wire fencing protecting them and they look like mini submarines. They are coated in green paint for disguise. It took us a while to find the post, but when we did it felt like Narnia. We climed down a long ladder, which took you about ten feet below the ground and there it was, a room with a bed, a sink, a fire blanket sign and what I think was an air raid siren. It was such a good feeling after going down there. I have to confess, I wasn’t too keen on going down after seeing all the big hairy spiders; well lets just say that I’m not exactly a big fan of them. And what a better way to end such an exciting day by having some cheese and toast at a local cafe. I would definitly recomend it to you (not the cheese and toast but going to see the ROC posts I mean). If you like to explore and you like your history, go and hunt for some ROC posts. Here are some photos to show you what it looked like.

Laura

: The hatch

Thanks Laura for writing this guest post and for taking the great pictures. Are there any ROC posts near you? Download this Google Earth file (there will be

Yorkshire landscapes as QTVR images

Published

Noel Jenkins

on July 12, 2009

in Photographs and Teaching resources

. 1 Comment

I’ve made some spherical panoramas of some classic limestone features of the Yorkshire Dales.

Malham Cove, Yorkshire Dales National Park, UK in England

Malham Cove
Limestone pavement above Malham Cove
Gordale Scar

These images will be added to my geographical panoramas page at Juicy Geography. I’ve managed to wear out my trusty tripod and need to buy a new one – so the usual plea about not embedding etc, without a donation applies. I’m working on an alternative way of displaying these images with more features, and without the distracting thumbnails when viewing at full screen.

Changes in dairy farming – new 360 image

Published

Noel Jenkins

on June 28, 2009

in 3D visualization, Photographs and Teaching resources

. Closed

I was stunned by the robotic technology in use at the neighbouring farm. The cows decide when to be milked! Great for a GCSE case study on agricultural changes:

Robot milking parlour at Orway Farm, Devon in England