Fill me up — My Sight

I’ve always been attracted to abandoned buildings. Peeling paint, rusting signs, broken windows and anachronistic architecture never fail to draw me in. Lately, I’ve been seeing a lot of boarded up gas stations. Maybe it’s a sign of the times, or maybe I’m just noticing them more.

I saw at least a half dozen on a recent three-day solo (and socially distant) drive up the Northern California and Oregon coasts. I’ve been photographing a lot of architectural subjects lately, and run-down structures typically catch my eye. Closed restaurants, abandoned military bases, empty houses and the like. But until that trip up north, I hadn’t really focused on old gas stations. Maybe that’s because, as the NPS says in its monograph about preserving the buildings, we don’t really notice gas stations unless we’re out of gas.

Whatever the reason, I think I will be keeping an eye out for gas stations from now on. They are architecture as advertising. Individually they reflect the decade in which they were built. Collectively, they create a fascinating record of our cultural history. A ubiquitous sign of our gas guzzling times. One day they may all be gone, along with the ozone-depleting products they peddled. The hitching post of our times. While many stations have been renovated and repurposed to great effect, for some reason I am drawn to those that are caught in between. No longer pumping gas, not yet renovated or torn down. Finding and photographing them could be an interesting long-term project. Perhaps even one that can help fill up my creative tank.

I found this old gas station in Orick, California, just south of the Humboldt Redwood parks. The faded green paint and decaying black tractor trailer parked out front captured my attention so I hung a quick U-turn and pulled over to take a closer look. Apart from the usual allure of a rundown building, I liked how the truck trailer was framed within the former pump island and the canopy had cast a rectangular black shadow across the building, echoing the form of the truck. The tidy bookcase behind the spattered window and the numerous signs warning trespassers away added a bit of mystery to the scene, as did the crow perched atop the power pole. I worked the reflection in the puddle for quite a while. Given the angles and lighting it was a battle between getting more puddle and keeping the entire pump canopy in the frame.

That puddle reminded me of another old gas station I had shot a few weeks earlier, just south of Petaluma. Maybe that’s what perked my attention on the way up north.

I had seen this station from the highway a number of times before, and repeatedly told myself I would pull off and photograph it the “next time” I drove past. Well if I’ve learned anything from shooting abandoned buildings it’s that sometimes next time is too late. So I finally got around to convincing myself that next time was now, and drove up to take a look.

I hadn’t seen clouds in a long while (California seems to be facing another drought), and enjoyed how they softened the light and added some drama to the scene. I wandered around the building as I worked to find some shooting angles that would minimize the impact of the chain link fence around the station. I was captivated by the puddles and reflections in the cracked concrete. Fortunately, I arrived early enough to capture the scene before the clouds moved away, leaving us with yet another bright blue boring day.

Here are a few of the other stations I stumbled upon on my way up north. If you want to see more, check out my gallery of gas stations that have seen better days. The gallery is just a start. If you happen to know of another falling down station in California, please let me know in the comments below. And if there’s an old station or two in your neck of the woods, go out and shoot it before it disappears.

I found this space age canopy off I-5 just north of the California border, in the middle of nowhere. It is probably an old Phillips 66 station.