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UER Mobile > UE Tutorials, Lessons, and Useful Info > Tips for finding industrial sites? (Viewed 1650 times)

post by burplesnaps   |  | 
Tips for finding industrial sites?
< on 9/14/2021 7:43 PM >

Ive found my fair share of houses and barns using google maps just by looking for worn down roofs and overgrown grass. Using this method when searching for factories has only gotten me weird looks from security as all the places I've checked out were active and just looked like hell from the sky.

Do any of you more seasoned explorers have any good tips for this kind of exploration? If im asking for anything I shouldn't lemme know. Just joined and want to avoid making a bad impression on the community.


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post by ryanpics   |  | 
Re: Tips for finding industrial sites?
<Reply # 1 on 9/21/2021 12:57 AM >

Do the same thing, but then do a little bit of research further. It's hard to be entirely sure what you're getting into with a lot of "abandoned" industrial places. Look up the address and check street view and satellite images to see if there are different cars parked there from different times. The date picker on street view is very useful for seeing if its shape took any drastic changes. Use the city or county's GIS, if they have that in Canada, to find the owner and previous owners.

Or just drive around in the slums of an industrial city and pick a random building.


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post by dirtbagdav   |  | 
Re: Tips for finding industrial sites?
<Reply # 2 on 12/2/2021 3:02 PM >

I'll spend a bit of time searching hashtags. People spend a bunch of time hashtagging for exposure, IG, Flickr, wherever. Start with the generic #yourcity + #urbex + #abandoned, see if anything interesting catches your eye, then have a look through the rest of the tags. You can sometimes find the factory name in the tags, and with that you can easily get an address. It's not surefire, but you can luck out.


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post by Steed   |  | 
Re: Tips for finding industrial sites?
<Reply # 3 on 12/2/2021 4:29 PM >

Maybe watch the news for any information about factory closures.


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post by Dee Ashley   |  | 
Re: Tips for finding industrial sites?
<Reply # 4 on 1/9/2022 4:56 AM >

Posted by ryanpics
Do the same thing, but then do a little bit of research further. It's hard to be entirely sure what you're getting into with a lot of "abandoned" industrial places. Look up the address and check street view and satellite images to see if there are different cars parked there from different times. The date picker on street view is very useful for seeing if its shape took any drastic changes. Use the city or county's GIS, if they have that in Canada, to find the owner and previous owners.

Or just drive around in the slums of an industrial city and pick a random building.

(Emphasis added)

The day of the week can make a difference. If I see something that looks abandoned and no cars, I’ll sometimes look at the local schools nearby to see if they have cars. If they don’t, the image might have been taken On a holiday or a weekend and I might look at that empty parking lot next to the location of interest with a little more skepticism.
This is just one of the many clues that might not mean much by itself but if you do several different things like this you might be able to lower your error rate and figure out with a higher degree of certainty the status of a location.




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post by Aran   |  | 
Re: Tips for finding industrial sites?
<Reply # 5 on 1/10/2022 4:17 AM >

Railroads and rivers are usually pretty good areas to look for industrial ruins. Getting large amounts of materials in and out of a factory requires transportation, and for a very long time the rivers and the railroads were the primary means of transportation.

Due to zoning regulations a lot of industrial buildings will usually be clustered in an industrial district, and the rivers and tracks will usually run through it. Follow them to the industrial district and look for signs of abandonment such as roof damage or overgrown parking lots. Then follow the tracks and rivers out from the district and you might find outlying factories outside the district that are still close to those transportation routes.

On a different note, look for industrial brownfield/superfund sites too. Those are industrial areas that are heavily contaminated and require a great deal of costly clean up to repurpose. You'll find a lot of non-abandoned stuff on there too, but it can be a good starting point to track down factories that were abandoned simply because cleanup was too expensive.


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post by emptymouthfulofthoughts   |  | 
Re: Tips for finding industrial sites?
<Reply # 6 on 1/28/2022 2:53 PM >

Posted by Aran
Railroads and rivers are usually pretty good areas to look for industrial ruins. Getting large amounts of materials in and out of a factory requires transportation, and for a very long time the rivers and the railroads were the primary means of transportation.


You can have a decent amount of luck if you walk along railroads that are completely out of use. Usually a rail line being abandoned is already part of local knowledge, or it can fairly easy to tell based on the condition of the rails. If you aren't sure about a track though be careful. Trains aren't very people friendly.


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post by Dee Ashley   |  | 
Re: Tips for finding industrial sites?
<Reply # 7 on 4/25/2022 3:52 AM >

Posted by Aran
Railroads and rivers are usually pretty good areas to look for industrial ruins. Getting large amounts of materials in and out of a factory requires transportation, and for a very long time the rivers and the railroads were the primary means of transportation.

Due to zoning regulations a lot of industrial buildings will usually be clustered in an industrial district, and the rivers and tracks will usually run through it. Follow them to the industrial district and look for signs of abandonment such as roof damage or overgrown parking lots. Then follow the tracks and rivers out from the district and you might find outlying factories outside the district that are still close to those transportation routes.

On a different note, look for industrial brownfield/superfund sites too. Those are industrial areas that are heavily contaminated and require a great deal of costly clean up to repurpose. You'll find a lot of non-abandoned stuff on there too, but it can be a good starting point to track down factories that were abandoned simply because cleanup was too expensive.


Be careful when targeting sites designated as superfund, brownfield, etc. Many states have enhanced criminal penalties if you’re caught inside of them.
I know from personal experience that the state of Texas will enhance a misdemeanor trespassing charge if the location falls under a designation of “superfund,” “critical infrastructure,” or “habitation.”


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