King’s Park Psychiatric Centre was a complex of dozens of buildings intended to house individuals with mental problems. It operated from 1885 to 1996. At its peak, there were close to 10,000 patients.
The remains of the buildings are haunting.
The intent was good. Of course. The idea was to provide a healthy environment for these patients to live in, where they could work on farms and workshops and be fed and housed at state expense.
We are told that governments came to believe this was not a good way to deal with mental patients and the population of Kings Park was reduced through drug therapies, transfers to other institutions, and simple release. I have read that many of these patients ended up homeless, but I don’t see any clear documentation about the disposition of the thousands of patients. But they are all gone and the buildings have been abandoned for about 30 years. Some of them were demolished. Some of them had asbestos in them complicating the idea of recycling the structures. The remaining buildings are decaying. There is a lot of graffiti. People break into the buildings to take photos and videos.
There is something about the ruins that fascinates people.