One of the recent fads or trends of art/photography recently has been depicting or exploring abandoned urban or industrial ruins. Railways seem to magnetically attract these types.

We've seen, and even participated in, such exploits for years. I don't think there isn't a reader of this forum over, say, thirty that hasn't explored the scrap lines of a railroad yard, or sneaked into an old abandoned station or tower.

But more and more people are getting in on it. And just like the Gen X'er who suddenly thinks the hobo's life may be for him, there are folks out there who are blissfully unaware of the real dangers that may be involved.

The Huber Breaker photo essay linked here: Exhibit A. Other examples made popular over the years include/included Buffalo Central Terminal, Detroit Terminal, and the scrap lines at Barry, South Wales, Naporano in New Jersey, Pielet Bros. in Illinois, and the like.

News Story of the Day: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-nort ... s-17095194


Recently while driving down Falls Road in Baltimore in the vicinity of the Baltimore Streetcar Museum, I saw three photographers climbing around the stored iron-bridge structure that is kept on BSM property nextto the road and tracks awaiting "adaptive reuse". I pulled over, willing to be a "docent" and elaborate on the history of this structure, when I saw them..... a troupe of about twenty photography students from a local university, being led about by a photography professor. Now, this professor had already been asked twice in previous occasions not to come traipsing through BSM property without advance notice--indeed, we had thrown them out of the body of a PCC car awaiting scrapping and off the storage docks of the BSM shop building, where I had witnessed the students picking up items to pose "artistically" or whatnot. Yet this time, I couldn't say anything.

You see, they weren't on BSM property. They were traipsing about the back of the old Maryland & Pennsylvania roundhouse, still in use by the City of Baltimore as a salt storage depot. This is a site that is not exactly safe even when nobody is about, and trespassers are not welcome for various other reasons. And they were doing it hours before a predicted snowstorm, as the city was frantically loading dozens of dump trucks at the site with front-end loaders. And this professor was leading her students right in through the trucks lining up for their loads.

I could only watch in horror. Within minutes the site's manager had corralled the troupe, and was, as best as I could tell, reading this professor the riot act and handing her and the students their posteriors; I'm reasonably sure the police were in the process of being summoned. Seemingly reluctantly and disgruntlingly, she and the students returned to the cars in which they had car-pooled to the property. Judging from past conversations others and I have had with this "professor," she may be an academic, but she is blissfully clueless about the concept of private property, property lines, and whatnot, and/or believed (quite wrongly) that everything in that valley was taxpayer-owned.

We have folks in the BSM who take the attitude that "any publicity is good publicity." Of course, the director that's an attorney takes a different view, related to potential liability. The PCC awaiting parting out is now covered in tarps once again, if only to prevent the "attractive nuisance" dilemma the car posed before.

So how, if at all, can we reconcile an interest in "urban/industrial exploration" with the real problems of both bad PR image (no one wants to see their museum presented as a "pile of rust," after all) and safety/liability concerns? Could we encourage a "photo day" in the "back 40" as a fundraiser? Or should we see their missions as entirely anathema to ours? Are any of these our future volunteers?

I have had extensive experience with urban explorers at the Carrie Furnaces National historic Landmark. On a nice warm sunny day we may have up to a dozen or more UEs come by the site. Our policy is to turn them back and to give them contact information of the person to talk to about legally coming on the site and photographing. We of course charge for that privilege. Some actually do organize photography safaris, others turn around never to return and a few come back again when they think nobody is there.

Yes its a big problem, and nobody thinks about the dangers involved until there is an injury, and then all of a sudden they want to pin all the blame and liability on us. Our backwards legal system allows them to do just that.

One of our best volunteers started out as an UE. I say that is an anomaly, as most of the others who come with cameras want to pick up nothing more than a camera. Many are openly hostile to the prospect of actually reserving the site, desiring to instead let it remain as a ruin so they get "more interesting shots".

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Re-run topic. I think we know you don't like urban explorers. :-)

http://www.rypn.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=31171&hilit=4876

"Budding photographers seem to go through phases. Macor shots. Dead trees. Night photos. Junk cars/trains/ships. HDR photography. Black and White... All done in the name of "art". "

Ah, fer chrissakes you budding photographers, just go shoot "art nudes". Much more fun than photo-ing rotten railroad stuff....

Howard P.
LOL, NY

There is a series of forums at http://www.uer.ca all about this growing field of interest.

Personally I would have no problems with urban explorers if i knew that they had the moral conviction to not succomb to the promises of ambulance chasers and sue property owners for injuries sustained while trespassing. But if you're laid up in a hospital suffering from injuries caused by falling through a floor or walkway, with no insurance and no way to pay the $100,000 in medical bills, and an ambulance chaser calls you up telling you that they can get the property owner to take away those bills, who would not take them up on the offer? How many of you could do it?

So that reason alone is enough to dislike the threat that urban explorers poses. If I invite you upon my property and you fall and hurt yourself while there then I would be liable if I created a condition that contributed to the fall and did not adequately protect you. But if you come on my property without giving me the opportunity to protect you from the hazards, then in my opinion anything that happens to you, including death, is entirely in your hands. But our laws aren't set up that way. Property owners have to be able to foretell the future and know when someone will trespass, where they will do it and how so that they can take precautions to prevent injury. Yet the trespasser is held to a much lower standard.

Touchy subject with me... Rant off.

So let me change the question a bit:

Art club or photography professor comes around in advance, and wants to bring 20-30 folks to do paintings/photography of your unrestored station or back in your "junk sidings."

Do you let them? Do you charge them? Do you have them sign a waiver? Do you contract to claim ten percent of the $200 or $2,000 for which they sell the resulting artwork?

The latter question is not a hypothetical. I saw the artwork in question, of a derelict piece at one museum sell--ironically, at a charity fundraiser for a third charity hosted at another railroad museum.

In that case we would charge around $200 and everyone would sign a waiver. We do these sort of "photo safaris" all the time.

I'd suggest embracing the "UE" group and promoting a legal and safe version of the activity on your sight. (For a fee/donation of course.)

Promote in like the "back stage" or "behind the scenes" tours some amusement parks offer. "Get a look at our restoration facility and our future projects. See what this stuff looks like before we work our magic. Go behind the scenes and visit locations not open to the public!" etc, etc... Only $xx per person, sign up today...

While you're at it, if you have a problem with "urban explorers" on your site, you also have a problem with security, as most railroads do. After you're done worrying about the guy with a camera having his scantily clad model fall off the roof while posing, ask what the local meth heads are going to steal for the scrapyard, and what the local railfans have access to that they can steal for their collections or the next swap meet. If the UE guys can get it, so can other, even less desirable people.

ObDisclaimer: Urban Explorers are, like any other subculture, diverse within their subculture, and what I'm about to say is not universal.

One of the credos of the urban explorer is DON'T get permission. It's not just because the owner might say no: it's actually a statement of rebellion against the very concept of ownership.


An attitude like that paints a target on your back. Since you presume the legal system hates you, you perceive the state of being sued as a "nightmare" which you will desperately do anything to escape. That makes you a rich, inviting target to the Jarek Molski's or Righthavens of the world who fabricate lawsuits simply to get easy settlements.

A lawful-evil person would say "People like that are giving away free money, it violates your duty to yourself and your organization not to take it." Molski made his millions on the settlements that happened BEFORE he got barred because ONE person fought back. Settlements are final; that's the point of the things. If you settle an unjust case and your neighbor defends vigorously and wins, you have no recourse, nor do you deserve any, as your inaction placed a burden on others.

It's a lot like that "Selective Service" (draft) card I had to sign up for at the post office. You can get picked seemingly at random by society and asked to carry a heavy burden for society. If you are sued unjustly, then it falls to you to stop the injustice. No one else has legal standing - only you. Less than 1% of Molski's victims fought back. If that number had been just a few percentage points higher, it would have removed all financial incentive for people like Molski to do that. You can see where defeatist attitudes are the only true enemy of the legal system.

Sorry-- pet peeve.

No one from the Utah State Railroad Museum has any right to complain. They were the ones who decided to take down the fences and now they have to deal with the consequences.

Aaaannnnd in *other* news, I just saw a video story on tonight's CBS News "glamorizing" yet another one of these photographers waxing eloquent about the decay he photographs around Gary, Detroit, and Chicago........

If they are a real Urban explorer and not the "I saw this on TV and thought it would be fun" kind. Don't expect any kind of promotion because good exploreing spots are like good fishing spots hard to find and easely ruined by word getting out. So they stay tight liped on locations.

Its funny this whole thread, i get anywhere i want to round here just by asking nicely, people think i am nuts but thats to be expected, but there is nothing like the satisfaction of sharing what you have found or taken pictures of with the land/property owners and you will always welcomed back. These militant type 'you owe me' people are a pain in the a.. and spoil it for everyone else.

Mike Pannell

Cheyenne

OP, the Huber breaker photo essay you had linked to(link now dead) is taken by one of our best railroad photographers. Just a bit of irony I guess...