After having reported on American cities which could be lost or become wastelands in the future, we found a list of 20 cities that are already lost. The WebUrbanist blog, a blog on urban design, travel, architecture and alternative art, has composed a list of 20 abandoned cities from around the world.

There are many reasons why cities get lost; some, like the ghost towns of the American West, have become tourist destinations while others have been condemned or simply forgotten. A list of 20 abandoned cities of the world share an eerie, haunted quality that is part of what makes them so fascinating. When you are interested in more amazing abandoned places by region, visit the WebUrbanist abandonments archive.

These are the 20 lost cities:

• Kowloon Walled City, China (a former watchpost to protect the area against pirates)
• Oradour-sur-Glane, France (a village with a former population of 642, that was razed during World War II)
• Kolmanskop, Namibia (a town which once was a diamond mining town before other areas we discovered)
• Humberstone, Chile (a city that benefited from mining and processing nitrate)
• Wittenoon, Australia (a former mining town which was a home to 20,000 people until it was shut down after the health risks of asbestos)
• Gary, Indiana (when the steel industry took a downtown, the town became depressed and never recovered)
• Ruby, Arizona (the best preserved ghost town in Arizona, a former mining camp and once home to 1,200 people)
• Agdam, Azerbaijan (one a thriving city of 150,000 inhabitants, got lost in 1993 during a war)
• Bodie State Historic Park, California (one of many gold-mining ghost towns in the American West which once had 10,000 residents)
• Mandu, India (once a capital of a northern Indian state)

See the rest of the list, pictures and a lot more information here.

Do you know other examples for lost cities? Please share your thoughts.

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