Public Service Announcement to all Urban Explorers

If you take pictures and write about your activities, prepare to get arrested:

It was a Web site filled with dark images of abandoned homes, factories and buildings throughout New Jersey.

The site displays photographs showing buildings, walls and cars with the date and time the pictures were taken and describing the locations in detail.

But police say the designer of the now-defunct site, www.abandonedandbeyond.com, also was breaking the law.

Fairfield police arrested 25-year-old Robert Pless of Wayne on Tuesday and charged him with burglary and criminal trespassing after the owners of a vacant factory in Fairfield discovered someone had broken into their building and posted pictures of its interior on the Internet.

Speaking as someone who can be classified as an “urban explorer”, I have conflicting feelings about this. The charges are ridiculous, especially the burglary charge because:

Police were unable to offer a motive for the break-ins, since it did not appear that items were stolen from the sites.

However there’s a related issue bouncing around the UE (urban explorer) community on the pros and cons of making this information public to begin with. Why? People can’t be trusted to be responsible. For instance, the old fire truck at the long-abandoned Flushing Airport which sat relatively untouched for fifty years until it appeared in Forgotten New York in 2001. Three years later, the poor truck is stripped to the bone.

Similar deterioration has occurred out in the western ghost towns. Old ghost town and mining camp guides from the 60s spoke of extensive ruins and “movie set quality” sites that by the time I got there in the mid-80s where nothing more than charred remains and ATC tire tracks. What to do? I’m not sure… I don’t trust people to do the right thing, and I certainly do not trust Authority, who’s response will either be prosecution or a realization that such sites are a commodity. I suppose the only thing to do in the near-term is to retreat back to obscurity. And be sure to password-protect those web sites.

On the other hand, I firmly believe that this is an abomination:

An exciting new Discovery Channel series to air in 2004 is casting for the following:

1) An adventurous, dynamic, structural engineer –interest in urban exploration & archeology is a plus.
2) A hip, buff female rock climber/extreme athlete
3) A dynamic, young caver
4) A quirky cutting-edge electronics whiz

All should be telegenic, engaging, with unique and memorable personalities, interested in trying their hand at urban exploration. WeÂ’re looking for people with the desire and charisma to become national TV celebrities.

This series will explore the culture of urban exploration – going into abandoned structures, tunnels, bridges, towers – the hidden zones in our cities where mere mortals fear to tread – or at least have no idea that they exist. We are assembling an “A-Team,” 2-3 unforgettable individuals with particular areas of expertise who will set out on various exotic urban adventures. At each stop they will meet members of the local urban exploration community, who will help them along their way.

Can there be at least ONE geek hobby left alone without being co-opted into trash? It was bad enough seeing robot combat degenerate into the hideous sub-WWF “Battlebots”, and this just sends me into adrenal frenzy. For Cthulhu’s sake… please don’t cooperate with these assholes.