fun

Oct 13, 2023

3 min read

haydite, cleveland, industrial, hiking, photography, cuyahoga valley national park, prints, photography prints, land reclamation, Hemlock Creek Trail

haydite and steel
conservation and reclamation
it will be interesting to see this site in a few years
curious to see what comes of this structure.
it was a rotary kiln for the haydite mine.
now it stands alone, except for those that venture off the path slightly.

fun

$500

Dimensions 18" x 12"
Printed on photo glossy paper mounted on sintra in 1/8" acrylic, encapsulated in vinyl.

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This haydite mine was interesting. I had seen pictures of it on the internets before, and knew it was in Cleveland somewhere but I just did not expect to come around a corner on a Cuyahoga Valley National Park trail and see the rotary kiln standing there in all of its anachronistic beauty. You can't get much closer than up against a leaning fence to see it unless you want to go against some signs warning of prosecution.

The mine created haydite which is used for filling retaining walls and other mundane building material uses as well as on athletic fields. Shale would be blasted from the mine area, and run through the rotary kiln heated to around 2000 degrees The mine is a massive area in Independence, Ohio near where Hemlock Creek Trail crosses over Stone Road. The trail is a nice little out and back hike only around 2 miles, and there seemed to be quite a few e-bikes flying along the trail so be careful if you go walking with a dog as they seem to come by quick and often.

The mine was previously owned by DiGeronimo Aggregates and was one of the largest open strip mines in the state of Ohio. The city purchased 32 acres of the land in 1995 to prevent it from turning into a landfill and the mine was closed in 2019, with the property being turned over to the West Creek Conservancy and National Parks Service to be converted to a recreational space. The strip mine will be allowed to fill with water and land grading done to make it more of a useful park area. In 2019 it was estimated to take 6 years to convert the land to recreational space, I cant wait to see its new life and I also kind of hope they leave the kiln there.