It was an easy solo drive to Buffalo from there. I flew into Cleveland leaving from an eerily quiet LaGuardia Airport in New York City and arriving at another semi-deserted airport at my destination. It turns out that wandering around a huge grain elevator complex with a couple of cameras and a tripod is something that can be done with lots of social distancing and in compliance with New York State Covid-related restrictions then in effect. Most things I had in my calendar were cancelled or postponed. There was very little organized travel happening in summer 2020. As 2020 progressed I thought that for sure the August workshop would be cancelled. That was before Covid hit and the lockdowns came into effect. In 2019 I signed up for Mark’s August 2020 workshop. After a bit of research I found out about an annual photography workshop at Silo City run by Georgia based photographer Mark Maio. I was so fascinated by the area that I was determined to return and spend a little more time exploring along the river. There’s a lot going on around there for the visitor, with restaurants, kayak and bike rentals, a maritime museum with US Navy ships (including the USS Little Rock guided missile cruiser, the only surviving vessel from the Cleveland Class of light cruisers in World War II), a waterfront park and much more, including Buffalo River history tours by boat which is how I got to view Elevator Alley and stop off at the huge Silo City complex the first time. Among other things, I visited the “Canalside” area of the city’s waterfront by the historic western terminus of the Erie Canal in Buffalo. In 2018 on my big Erie Canal drive I spent several days in Buffalo. Lawrence Seaway), and this resulted in the closure and abandonment of many of the huge silo complexes. In the 20th century the grain industry in Buffalo declined as transportation modes and routes changed (caused in no small part by the opening of the St. Much of the grain produced in the midwestern agricultural heartland of the United States was once shipped through Buffalo, and the city was the site of the largest grain port in the world. Sound familiar? We could be talking about Cleveland, Detroit, Newark, Pittsburgh, South Bend or any number of other deindustrialized Rust Belt cities I have mentioned in my posts over the last years. Since then the economic decline has been marked, with a loss of over half of its population as businesses have closed and jobs have disappeared. At the beginning of the 20th century, it was one of the most populous cities in the United States. They are also remarkably photogenic.īuffalo was once a tremendously important industrial center. The sheer size of these mostly concrete behemoths is incredible. The stretch of the river beginning in Canalside at the Buffalo Harbor is lined with historic grain elevators – a few are still operating, some have been (or are planned to be) repurposed, and others sit there abandoned awaiting an uncertain future. The subject of this post will be my explorations of “Elevator Alley” along the Buffalo River which contains one of the largest (and densest) collections of grain elevators in the world. You’ll see for yourselves in this and the next couple of posts. As it turned out, my two stays there vastly exceeded my expectations – just like Detroit and Cleveland were also revelations. Like Cleveland, Detroit and many other US Rust Belt cities on and near the Great Lakes the buzz on Buffalo is not great. Honestly, prior to my first visit to Buffalo in 2018, in my wildest dreams I didn’t expect to see all that I did there and like the city so much. It will be the first of several posts in Buffalo. Our starting point: the Buffalo River in the city of Buffalo on Lake Erie near the original western terminus of the Erie Canal. As promised, with this post I am going to start the journey along the length of the famed Erie Canal in upstate New York.
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