It looks like the famous East River Intercontinental Airport (ERIA) and surrounding areas have been abandoned in recent months which is really sad news. All that now remains of East River community is the small Villas of Helvellyn (shown above) which are pretty much empty now. Second Life has lost one of it’s popular and largest Second Life cities.
East River Community (ERC) was founded on 28th April 2008 and is a federation of groups located on the Sansara continent in Second Life. Over the years thousands of residents have visited the city and made happy memories there.
In November/December 2021 the main landowner for the project left Second Life and the parcels reverted to Linden Lab ownership a few weeks later. Apparently there were no investors to save it. The ERC used to offer art galleries, cafes, public venues, shopping areas, commercial and residential rentals, music concerts, an airport, nautical and community events.
Updates from the East River Community Facebook page last year.
16th November 2021
An announcement:
It appears one of our larger landowners has left the community, and there is another landowner who is making contemplation to do the same. While I do not blame either of them (as the ERC has been rather unsustainable in its current size and model for many years now), we are rapidly approaching a point where some hard decisions are going to need to be made; specifically
a) either we find substantial investors/new landowners willing to take on the tier and take over operation of the community as a whole, and implement a way to bring traffic and revenue to the place, or
b) we make plans to permit the ERC to finally fold and dissolve.
I am hereby putting any expansion or renovation projects I had in mind on hold or canceling them outright. I will only be periodically checking for grief, broken, and squatting, until such time as it is clear what the future will hold.
If you have any concerns about any particular location or build, I advise you to check land ownership of that specific parcel and contact the landowner directly; I am not a landowner, I am only a groundskeeper, so will be unable to assist.
– Elisha Paklena
1st December 2021
The core of Helvellyn Town has returned to Linden control and is now inaccessible. Same with ERIA and the majority of the Borough parcels. I am not holding out much hope for things. If you care to, please take a look at what remains before it is all gone. I have already said my peace.
I will retain room for miracles naturally but am not expecting one at this rate.
15th December 2021
Helvellyn Town is now gone, as is East River Intercontinental Airport, and several other core parcels. I am exiting the appropriate land groups as these parcels wipe. Once a critical amount of the build is gone, I will be dissolving this group, as there will not be an ERC at that point.
Empty Lands
The north side of the Helvellyn region as of Tuesday 8th March 2022 looking pretty much empty in many areas. It’s not clear what will happen in the next few months in the north part of the region.
It’s sad to see East River Municipal and the surrounding areas abandoned back to Linden Lab. Shame no one saved it and carried on the torch.
Daniel Voyager 
I’m so sorry for Eli. ERC was in the historic and expensive heart of Sansara, a real diamond. But every time I went there it was just tumbleweeds. As Eli said herself, unsustainable. 😦
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It’s such a shame that ERC has gone this way.
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I didn’t know about this before but would be happy to help – I used to run Poppyport before I lost it a long time ago – IM Sylvie Etoile
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This area is now coming back. I have been building an art community on the north side of the river for just about a year now and Lale has bought up much of the land and has built a city, an airport and a GTFO hub. This area actually has a fair amount of traffic now, especially with our art gallery events. Please help spread the word, I would love to see a follow up article to show how people are helping to bring locations back to life.
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