Abandoned Subway 1

Rochester Abandoned Subway: Part 01

April 5, 2026 • Joshua DeWinter

Introduction to the community

What the project is

For my first contribution, I have been working on the Rochester Abandoned Subway VR experience - a recreation of the Rochester Abandoned Subway in VR!

Why you picked it

I picked this project because VR is a big passion of mine, and I was put on this project for my DHSS Seminar with Jess

How Comm Arch showed this would be good to work with

It is a small project that I could really get into and work on in several capacities

What resources were already available

The project has been in development digitally since 2022, and in VR since 2024, with lots of photos and references for how the subway is layed out.

The issue

How I decided to pick the issue (and what it was)

The issue was that the previous project used teleport locomotion and could be broken easily.

How I pursued it

I setup a VR project in Godot that used smooth locomotion (push joystick to move in that direction) and had a sample demo for other contributors of the player controller in a very basic environment.

What happened during the process

Getting the project setup in VR had its hiccups (as it always does) with getting all of the settings set properly, but it all smoothed out in the end

What blocked the project

Not on the technical side as much (which is what I was primarily working on), but the images of the subway walls we were using as textures for the digital recreation had some issues and so that has been a bit of an ongoing struggle to work with them.

How I succeeded in getting it accepted/merged

I was a primary contributor and made the repository and so it was as simple as pushing to the repo!