Urban
Exploration
Juan ZePezauer
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Heat fills the dimly lit corridor, littered in a dense web of pipes and cables, through which many of the gaps are filled in with cobwebs. The floor is littered with bits of broken glass, and the walls covered with graffiti. The location? Stanford University. Beneath the buildings lies an often overlooked series of tunnels initially built for running steam throughout the campus. In the words of one alumni who spent much of their time at Stanford dedicating themselves to documenting the tunnels, “If you’re looking for a place on campus where you can really feel some history, naturally and unmodified, and explore a place that most people haven’t been and aren’t supposed to see, you can hardly do better than the campus steam tunnels.”
Urban Exploration is the practice of exploring manmade structures, almost always those which have been abandoned, left unused, or otherwise neglected. Though they can also simply just be places that you don’t really think about, places like infrastructure access points, sewers, or in some cases, steam tunnels. Many times this will involve crossing difficult terrain, walking through unstable or dangerous structures, as well as the occasional risk of problems with the law, since entering such places is oftentimes a legal grey area, or simply just comes with the risk of a small ticket for misdemeanor trespass. There are countless obstacles in the way of deciding to go out and explore these areas; there are frequent issues with the law
varying from mere gray areas to outright trespassing. The vast majority of locations are by their very nature inaccessible, and the vast majority of people are completely unaware that they even exist, let alone that there are people exploring them. Even if someone learns about a location, many times there will still be many more physical obstacles leading them away from considering why they might want to explore, such as dense overgrowth littered with thorns and bugs, sometimes asbestos and active steam pipes, and in locations for the particularly daring, razor wire, security guards, and even in some rare cases, radioactive materials. So what leads people towards this unorthodox hobby? Are the dangers themselves the attraction?
Is it simply an escape from modernity? Is it the documentation of the niche, being a historian of the obscure? Is it for the very unique brand of photography? Or is it simply just being in a place you know not many others get to be? ⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯ Much like a photographer’s eye transforms everyday objects into works of art, an explorer’s eye reveals the wonders hidden in places which anyone else wouldn’t register as anything other than a background element. Such an eye may lead one into an abandoned house, an asylum, slated to be torn down, a metal foundry left untouched since the Gold Rush, or many other such places which have long since become
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frozen in time. Dylan Sesco is an urban explorer who runs a small filming channel on YouTube with his brother Cole, which among other things includes brief videos documenting their excursions into historic sites, abandoned buildings, ghost towns, and other explorations. His videos take you on brief tours through a variety of locations, which The fascinating thing about the documentation of these places is that even knowing about their existence
“you can really feel some history, natu rally and unmodified, and explore a place that most people haven’t been and aren’t supposed to see,”
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often already places you in a very unique area of study. Researching their history is interesting due to just how niche of a subject it tends to be . Nonetheless I’ve still seen it cited multiple times as a motivation for exploration. There’s something about it that still draws some people in regardless. One such historian of the obscure I found while researching this subject can be found at https://stanfordsteamtunnels. wordpress.com/, the owner of which is a former alumni who spent their time documenting a network of underground steam tunnels beneath the university. The entirety of their research can be found on the site, and has been compiled into a document simply labeled as “The PDF.” The contents of which include the most detailed map of the tunnels currently
available to the public, a list of as many mentions of the tunnels as could be found in newspaper articles, magazines, and et cetera, as well as instructions on safety and how to access the various entrances into the subterranean network. The tunnels as it turns out are “actually somewhat common at many American universities, and most of them are quite old (Stanford’s dates to 1881) and have harbored many different secrets over the years.” Before widespread use of electricity it was simply the most efficient way to handle heat for an entire campus, and they remained that way right up until recently when renewable energy efforts had the steam pipes replaced with hot water mains. [continue scene 1 for a bit] While their efforts were mostly carried out in isolation there are also larger communities of Urban Explorers which can be found across the internet. Most of these larger forums first appeared in the late 90s and early aughts with the rise of
the Internet, when sites such as uer.ca began creating databases of interesting sites for explorers readily available. A rise which some have attributed to television series on the discovery and history channels bringing attention to obscure locations and spreading the notion of exploration to a wider audience. The history of Urban Exploration is, by its nature, rather difficult to pin down. James Nestor, in an article for SFGate does however bring to light a few notable examples, such as “Cataphiles” from the 18th century exploring the famous Parisian Catacombs, Walter Whitman publishing accounts of his
excursions in 1861, 1920s Parisian Dadaists organizing tours through abandoned Churches, and MIT students “hacking” their way onto rooftops in the 1960s. However the hobby also seemed to have received a jump in popularity in the late 90s and early aughts with the rise of various online sources and forums related to Exploration. He also notes however that the term “Urban Exploration” seems to not have originated until 1996 with “Infiltration: the zine about going places you’re not supposed to go” which featured “editorials, exploring advice and information, articles on recent expeditions, and interviews, all illustrated with maps, pictures and
diagrams.” (infiltration.org) While the zine is no longer in print, it and the other works of its creator, the late Jeff Chapman, seemed to have had a significant influence or at least have merely effectively described many aspects of the culture of UrbanEx today. Chapman, an avid explorer, who usually hid under his (somewhat ridiculous) pen name “Ninjalicious”, also authored a book called Access All Areas, which is still recommended as a must read primer to Urban Exploration at the very top of the sidebar for the UrbEx forum reddit.com/r/UrbanExploration, gives detailed advice on safely and respectfully exploring various locations. One of the core themes of Access All Areas, is being sure that you’re exploring in the spirit of exploration. Throughout the entire book the author always tries to keep a distinction between vandalism and exploration, regularly emphasizing that
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these places are to be preserved for the good of everyone. In fact he makes this clear in the opening paragraph of the book, explaining that: “This book is a guide for hobbyists. It is intended to enhance and enlighten the reader’s appreciation of his or her landscape, and is written with great respect for the sites described herein. We are staunch defenders of these sites and will battle for their conservation. Our tourism is not one of exploitation, but rather of reverence. “ (Chapman 1) This theme is heavily enforced throughout the book, and almost all the advice given in the book is molded by this lens. [list a few more examples here] He even goes so far as to advise against sharing specific information with those who aren’t motivated to explore, stating that “Giving the general public too much of the wrong sort of information [...] can make a site more attractive and vulnerable to people who aren’t primarily motivated by the urge to explore, such as vandals [...] thieves [...] or other bad people of all stripes looking to make the world a worse place.” (Chapman 213-214) a statement which I’ve seen echoed by other explorers, such as Sesco who stated “There is a balance we try to find to show these places, but also not exploit these places. We want them to be preserved as much as possible. There are many people out there with ill intentions so as far as filming, sometimes we have to be careful about how much we show and give away.”
The culture of exploration described in Chapman’s work seems to have been the gold standard for the communities dedicated to UrbanEx that still stand today. The way I even learned about Access All Areas is because it’s listed right at the very top of the sidebar as a must read for anyone visiting reddit.com/r/UrbanExploration, and if you scroll down below that many of the rules and guidelines set by the moderators match Chapman’s vision, the first of which clearly declares “FORUM RULE: NO LOCATION SPECIFICS IN COMMENTS, ONLY BY [PRIVATE MESSAGE].” The next five support with recommendations to approach the areas safely and with respect. The actual content of the subreddit is filled with excellent works of photography taken form various peoples’ expeditions, and [bla
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[yet to be placed in idk where ill put this:] Urban Explorers have an interesting relationship with the law. Many of the areas commonly favoured by explorers are often legal grey areas, such as storm drains and some utility tunnels, which are not clearly defined due to their technical status as public land. However, of course those are not the only places that explorer’s tend to limit themselves to, and as Dylan Sesco remarks, to many explorers, “[getting] fined or in trouble, that’s part of the game. It’s worth it to me to document these places [...] and this is just another risk.” (Sesco) However, while normally trespassing comes only with at worst a small ticket or fine, as Chapman explains, “we cannot [...] reassure you that the legal climate where you live will not contort your good or harmless intentions out of fear.” (Chapman 1) many times it is possible for charges to be unfairly raised to burglary or breaking and entering. The claims for breaking and entering in particular are often
ridiculous in his view, for example there are times simply pushing open an unlocked door already slightly ajar is enough to technically qualify for breaking and entering despite the fact that absolutely no breaking
“I would hope that people could behave more respectfully and appreciate these places.” had occurred. In Chapman’s words “‘Entering’ just didn’t sound sinister enough on its own, so they had to partner it up with ‘breaking’ and hope it would come to sound evil by association” (Chapman 75) Likewise, claims of burglary can often be unfairly levied against explorer’s due to the fact that the burden of proof is only that one
enter with the intention of coming to steal something, regardless of whether anything was even touched, let alone stolen. Such circumstances make the motto of “Take only pictures” not only a matter of respect and decency, but an outright necessity in some cases in order to avoid unjust claims of burglary and/or breaking and entering merely for disturbances that would otherwise hardly even be noticed. And in fact the statement may be a little lax, in some cases some go the extra mile of ensuring that not even footprints are left, and keep their pictures only to themselves. Such treatment by the law has made the concept of Usufruct a widely popular idea among explorers. Usufruct is a former legal concept that no longer exists today but was often included in various legal codes of the past. Likely originating in ancient Rome it’s roughly the idea that as long as you do not harm someone’s property in any way whatsoever, you cannot be charged for making use of it. When asked about it Sesco
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said, “ [Insert somewhere idk:] Much like a photographer’s eye transforms everyday objects into works of art, an explorer’s eye reveals the wonders hidden in places which anyone else wouldn’t register as anything other than a background element. [use this transistion somewhre:] The camera shutter clicks, and as the light from the flash fades the noises of the busy street are replaced with the hissing of steam and the manhole above {or} A whir from the lens, a few knobs twist, the shutter snaps shut, and as the flash fades, so do all the noises of the busy street, and the door of the abandoned building slams shut [throwaway line:] The click of a shutter echoes the click of a lock. [throwaway line:] Just as being dismissive of every single thing created with a spray can on the side of a wall in the street as mere graffiti will just as easily include dismissing beautiful works of street art, murals, and even the works of professional artists such as Banksy. So too will dismissing exploration as dangerous reckless trespassing will just as easily include missing all the wonder hidden down the path less travelled.
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Works Cited:
https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Caves-Urban-explorers-discover-secret-world-2458522.php#item85307-tbla-2 http://subvert.pw/a/1434604566520-1.pdf http://www.infiltration.org/home.html https://stanfordsteamtunnels.wordpress.com/ https://expertphotography.com/urban-exploration-photography-tips/ https://www.sfgate.com/travel/article/The-Art-of-Urban-Exploration-2546675.php Interviews https://docs.google.com/document/d/1LnZ_K7pfPQVMxIbAso5nq3lAQMZ9nw6GFXhd3ZBtKy4/ edit?usp=sharing https://docs.google.com/document/d/18INhCiTqkuVO7ehcMFEAzUjnoAXhNIzD1rBa8eEHYa8/ edit?usp=sharing
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Juan Zepezauer Is a student at Freestyle Academy of Communication Arts and Technology. Their plans for the future include coming up with a plan for the future. In their free time they can often be found messing with Photoshop.
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