In the depths of River Hall there is a bad room. Stay away.

New York City has its fair share of creepy basements. Of course, basements are home to all those creatures that thrive in the deep dark: roaches, rats, the beast, centipedes, etc. No wonder they’re so freaky. But sometimes, a basement goes above (or below, I guess) and beyond in its creepiness.

In the basement of River Hall there is a room. Down the elevator, left into the lounge, left again past the sad little fitness room. There, you will find, to the left of the (also quite freaky) computer room, the River Hall “exit room.”

The exit room is empty, save a single chair. It is small, stuffy, unused, and unusable. A camera sits on the wall, staring into nothingness with its beady eye. Save for one bitter white fluorescent light, the only illumination is a deep red glow emanating from the Exit sign.

I’ll admit, even going down there just to take photos for this article made me anxious. There’s something so off about the exit room; a creature darkness. Like something terrible once happened in it. The room feels alive and malevolent, like a childhood night terror put into architecture. I couldn’t bear to close the door behind me once inside. To sit alone in there for ten minutes would probably drive me insane… that is, if nothing else got to me first.

Maybe it’s so off-putting because this room makes no sense. The hallway ends right between the two rooms, so why not just extend the computer room and combine the two? Why is there an entire room–with a heater–dedicated solely to housing the door to the emergency exit? There’s even another exit elsewhere in the basement!

Also, what’s the deal with the camera? Who’s watching us in there, and what could possibly be so important as to require constant surveillance?

In short, I do not recommend visiting this cursed room. It’s definitely haunted. I’m not even sure that the “exit” door in the room is even a real exit; it’s probably a portal into some twisted nightmare dimension. Whatever the truth of the exit room may be, I’m not sticking around long enough to learn it. I fear for my sanity.

Images via Author