Question - Best Urbex Hotspots in the UK?

[Olkka]

Thanks mate that’s really helpful. Sounds like certain areas still have their specialties. Interesting you say about Manchester and Bradford as spots for drains as I’ve always been interested in getting in to that. Why are these two standout areas?

I'm v unexperienced RE drains but I hear from the aficionados that those two systems have superior extent, variety, vintage etc

 

[mookster]

Most places have very little nowerdays tbh.

Historically there's been more to see in the big Industrial towns and cities of the North and I guess London but nowerdays everywhere is slim pickings. I've found over the years most cities have gone through a 'Regeneration" phase where they wipe away large industry and anything sitting derelict. Some places this had happened before we really started exploring. Other places more recently. There's definitely quite big cities that have always been somwhat sparse (Exeter, Cambridge, Oxford etc.)

Can confirm, having lived in Oxford my whole life, this is sadly the case now as the land is so valuable the University blob buys up everything and anything to turn into accomodation. However it did used to have a lot of stuff before 'urbex' was a thing, we're talking late 90s-mid 00s era. Rivermead Isolation Hospital, a lovely Victorian era hospital for instance was about a ten minute walk from my house but demolished in 2002, the old Lucy Iron Foundry - now apartments. The original Radcliffe Infirmary in it's entirety which was demolished in the late 2000s save for the original 1770 buildings I explored in 2010. The Oxford Brookes School of Health & Social Care which was an amazing looking place but loooong gone, to name a few.

However the one thing the wider county of Oxfordshire does/did have going for it was military installations, like Norfolk it's a very flat county. Two of arguably the best derelict RAF bases ever in the shape of RAF Upper Heyford and Bicester, the Islip fuel depot, and a whole load of other smaller military type things scattered around.

A few years ago I dedicated an entire summer to trying to find as much local Oxfordshire stuff as I could that hadn't been seen before, I did find some really nice things and some not so good things as is the way but was more than pleased with my local efforts.

 

[UrbandonedTeam]

Everywhere has stuff. Liverpool always seems to trump in producing consistently high quality places for years. Other highlights being Glasgow, London, Newcastle, South Wales, Manchester, Aberdeen, Kent, Huddersfield, the whole of Ireland. Urbex is in an exceptional state and there’s tons to do, just harder with competition from fb groups now

 

[urbanchemist]

North Wales or Wiltshire if you like mines.

Wiltshire? Not really apart from some tourist stone mines.
Not counting coal it's Cornwall, most of Wales, South/North Pennines, Lakes