The Ghost Chamber
Enlarged Erie Canal Lock 4 — Colonie, New York
Lat/Long: 42°44’47”N, 73°42’16”W
Photographed with century-old optical technology, this image looks into the stone interior of Enlarged Erie Canal Lock 4, constructed in the 1840s during New York’s major canal enlargement. Barges once entered this narrow space under towline, rising and lowering between Albany and the Champlain connection as freight moved through one of the busiest transportation corridors of the nineteenth century.
When the canal alignment shifted and the older route was abandoned with the rise of the Barge Canal System in the early twentieth century, Lock 4 was drained, the gates were removed, and the surrounding land was divided into residential lots. Only the chamber remained. What is left is an artifact of tool marks and carefully laid stone, built with a permanence that is likely to outlast any modern-day structure.
The beauty of a ruin like this lies in its survival, a chamber stripped of water and machinery yet still defined by the careful stonework that refuses to disappear.
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© 2025 John Bulmer Photography, John Bulmer Media, Nor'easter Films, and Restoration Obscura
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