After extracting all the useful stuff from a mine, you are often left with a lot of empty subterranean space without a clear purpose. This was the case with the Bethany Falls limestone mine, near Kansas City, Missouri, which left a sprawling series of caverns supported by 16′ (4.9 meter) diameter pillars courtesy of the used mining method. As detailed by [Benjamin Hunting] in a recent article on the Hagerty site, this made it a fascinating place for a business complex development now called SubTropolis that among other things is used for car storage by Ford and long-term stamp storage by the US Post Office. (Check out their cool period photos!)
The reason for this is the extremely stable climate within these man-made caverns, with relative humidity hovering around a comfortable 40% and temperatures stable year-round at about 21 °C (70 °F), making it ideal for storing anything that doesn’t like being placed outdoors, while saving a lot on airconditioning costs. With Ford one of the biggest companies in SubTropolis, this means that many companies providing customization services for vehicles have also moved operations inside the complex.
With the only negative being a lack of daylight, it seems like the perfect place for many businesses and (evil) lairs, assuming electrical power and constant air circulation are provided.
Featured image: “Subtropolis” by [ErgoSum88]
There’s one in Rosendale, NY also
“After extracting all the useful stuff from a mine, you are often left with a lot of empty subterranean space without a clear purpose.”
Our new home during climate change.
Reminds me of a picture of tunnels in Lebanon….
Neat to be able to re-use for something useful.
Cheap apartments. You’d have to get waste and power handled but not having to pay for air conditioning or heating would make them very cost-effective.
Any sizeable population would require air exchangers, etc. Coolin would only be a small part of that..
having lived in both desert and arctic locations, people’s use of heating/cooling seems to vary widely between seasons and locations. it was pretty common to see thermostats in phoenix set to 60-66 range (in freedom units) with a few misanthropes and server babysitters in the <50 range. alaska winter heater setting is usually like 74 and ive seen a few as high as 80+. my sister had some house guests and they burned through six weeks of firewood over a weekend, top floor had to be in the 90s. i ended up sleeping in the winter entry because it was the only room that wasnt an oven (id have slept outside in a hammock if not for the skeeters and bears). 70 seems like the perfect temperature though. i guess living like morlocks isnt all that bad.
Except youd have a hell of a time meeting building code requirements to have an egress window in every bedroom when youre 160 feet underground.
Egress windows as a requirement is silly given you aren’t gonna egress out of a high rise apartment building window (and the Fire department ladders won’t get there either).
Regardless, it must meet building codes if companies have offices and workshops there.
Does limestone have a Radon problem like granite?
It most certainly can. It’s a very efficient emitter of radon because of its permeability. The amount of radon it releases is a function of the amount of uranium in the bedrock.
Thanks!
55,000,000-square-foot (5,100,000 m2)
https://www.thedrive.com/wp-content/uploads/content-b/message-editor/1608746720158-inlinea.jpg?strip=all&quality=85
My father-in-law worked here back in the day, managed to flipped a car inside.
Until someone drills a hole into it :)
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Peigneur
(ok, that was a salt mine)
What a wild event! Well done to all involved for minimising loss of life!
As soon as Subtropolis is fully populated and Industries turn on all pf their machinery, that constant humidity and temperature might quickly shift towards uncomfortable values.
Constant temperature and humidity means that you dont have to fight the environmental variations of summer and winter. Heat rises and with 17 portals, 17 feet by 40 feet, that open to the ground surface, creating air flow, dealing with the heat produced by any machinery or processes is a relatively trivial concern.
You obviously have never been in the London Underground or Montreal metro.
Big difference between the two. Limestone caverns that far below ground will sink any heat generated into a rock mass large enough to deal with it for years.
The Underground and subway systems are indeed underground, but not as connected to the geologic strata as the abandoned mines. A lot of manmade heat sources go through those manmade tunnels and the effect is heat retention unless significant airflow is used to remove it. And they don’t.
Not only that but vibrations from any machinery might over time damage the integrity of the ceiling.
Prairie Plant Systems (Subterra) grows plants in old mines. The reasoning is that it is easier to produce the light needed for growing plants than it is to provide the heat. Looks like they’ve moved into BioPharma–makes sense since you can just lock the door for security. Good luck doing that in a field or conventional greenhouse.
Fantastic idea! Glad it’s being developed. Industrial scale non-field farming may be the way we get the food issue resolved. And as you point out, for Pharma purposes it’s a win/win.
The biggest problem isn’t production but distribution.
biopharma…
…so weed grow op?
The article mentions a great headline from a 1965 article:
“Parts Storage Area Completed After 560,000,000 Years”
Step 2 is convincing c-suite to move in.
Step 3 is closing the exits and filling it with water.
Bonus: it can then be drained and reused!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dKT1r-8viHk&list=PLGZbuWTzf2mLtcMMhb99VoFGOFPUlY4LN&index=19 Happily enough there’s a song for it
We have one of these in my area, too.
https://www.springfieldunderground.com/
I take out-of-town guests visiting us, down there and show them around. Some enjoy seeing it and others we never see again.
Very appropriately, there’s also a rock climbing gym down there. And a paint ball area. Plenty of strange potential down there. Just be sure to connect to the WiFi. Cell service is obviously terrible.