The Roundhouse

"I looked at you with curiosity, imagining the un-tapped potential you contained. Coming eye to eye, you looked beat. Your days of glory long past. Your tough exterior now erodes, revealing your soft side. Your long history now appears as well respected as the ‘Grad 2000’ graffiti that blemishes your walls. What man has made is now mocked by its creator as well as nature. But don’t worry, you were never meant to exist. See how the land struggles to re-claim you. The wind beats your walls to the earth where grass and weeds await to swallow you. So now you struggle to stand, awaiting collapse. Still, don’t be ashamed in your weakness. There is great beauty in this battle between you and nature. I am glad I had the pleasure of meeting you before you meet your demise..."
~Taken from my original photo description.

It was a late fall day and I was flying from Three Hills to Brooks and then to Hanna with a friend of mine when I first spotted this place. We were taking off west-bound from Hanna, when I noticed a crazy looking old structure just to the left of the track we were flying.

It was a roundhouse, a railway engine service and storage building probably from the 20's-40's. The structure curves around a rotating track called a turnpike, which rotated engines and pointed them toward the desired service bay.

I drove to the building about a week after the flight and took some daytime shots. The drive out there was long and boring and the town wasn't exactly a sight for sore eyes. Many buildings were badly weathered and neglected, which is sometimes cool because it makes for easy photo subjects, but it was also kind of depressing because it seemed like no-one cared about the town's appearance at all. Half the buildings on main street were either for sale/rent or closed till further notice.

The first time I went to the roundhouse at night was to do some evening shots when I was first experimenting with light-painting. The result was a photograph that is still one of my favourite photos of all time (the first picture in this article). It took nearly an hour to get it the way I wanted.

The town of Hanna is as redneck as they come. At 3:00 am, I was still in the building photographing and all through that time I could hear people within the town driving loud trucks, yelling and smashing beer bottles. One day while photographing here, I walked back to my car to notice some teenagers parked nearby on the back of their truck drinking beer. Hanna is also the hometown of Nickelback's Chad Kroeger. The roundhouse itself can be seen in their music video, Photograph:





Sorry for the lame advertisement... or if you don't like Nickelback either.

I was told by a local that the only time that Nickelback has ever made an official visit to Hanna was merely for this nostalgic video.

The roundhouse itself is a wonder to look at. The entire structure is made of wood and brick. The east end of the building has collapsed to the floor, but the rest of it is still standing, barely. Walking through the building for the first time I kept lifting my head upwards, completely amazed by the wooden roof and hanging lights. The building was definitely old and has seen many years of hard work.

The inside was mostly gutted of anything that gave reference to the original purpose of the building. The back of it was made into some sort of auditorium and some offices, a kitchen and bathrooms appeared to be added on or renovated later in it's life. Looking downwards, the building is quite pathetic, with a standard cement floor and some walls. There's a few abandoned vehicles inside that are nice, although most are completely covered in pigeon crap. The real beauty of this building is the roof and upper windows in the service bays. I have never been inside a building with cooler windows and rafters yet.

Outside, the grass is tall and there are a few trees around the building. In the fall and early spring, the golden colors give this building a gorgeous contrast and makes for some incredible photos. The old truck seen in the lower photo has apparently been moved. A friend of mine went down to Hanna a short time ago and said it was gone.

My recommendation to anyone curious and wanting to check this place out is to bring some good boots (there's nails everywhere), a dust mask (mould and pigeon poo) and a couple cans of beer in case you need to appease the locals. Oh yeah, and try your best to visit some shops in town and spend a little... they could use the boost.