Explorations and Adventures?

Lost In Capital City

Another awful Saturday with(out) awful people. I'd been planning a trip to see Hudson River psychiatric center in Poughkeepsie for the last few months, and thought I found a group of people to go with. Then starting Friday night, one after another backed out, the last two while I was already on the train east, and I tried spamming any possible explorers I knew, begging and bribing anyone to go with me. Of course no one did, and at least 6 new people blocked me on facebook. By the time I got to Albany I realized it was beyond hopeless…

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Cabinet Position

I usually try to stay away from going back to the same place over and over again, but when a new one appears and it's this easy to get to, it inevitably happens... in the past two weeks I've been in this damn hospital four times. Ordinarily every time I explore gets its own page, but that would just get too repetitious, so here goes... TRIP 1 - January 31 I didn't think I'd even bother to go that night, one of my friends was taking his pledge class into the creepy old hospital. Now, these places don't get haunted…

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Groundhog Day (Again)

The subway seems like it always was and always will be here. It's been abandoned for 55 years now, and while a piece here and there gets filled in sometimes, it's unlikely to ever see another train, or really any reuse other than the de facto graffiti gallery it's become. Every year since 1994, the Concrete Discussion Group has come here on or near Groundhog day to explore the tunnel and eat Dinosaur Barbeque. This year was the 20th, and, I'm starting to think, last time we celebrate the eventual end of winter and start of another exploring season. There…

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These Hollowed Halls

Nothing too exciting, but it seems like forever since I've been exploring. Just another trip to old rotten Iola, that gets just that much older and rotten-er every year... and always manages to escape the next threat of demolition Someone tore down the centerpiece of the Map Room. If I had any way to bring it home it would probably be on my wall now! It's off...

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Flying Fish Hospital

Genesee Hospital closed in 2000, and most of it was either demolished into a vacant lot, or renovated into offices, medical and otherwise. One building in between escaped either fate, and is sitting there wide open. It seems there was some effort to scrap and demolish it already, as almost all signs of being a hospital are gone, but for the time being it's still that rarity of an accessible new building right in Rochester. At some point I need to go back here during the day but it just gets dark too damn early here... This "tunnel" is on…

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Housing Is A Human Right

Almost a year after Occupy Rochester fell apart, we're at it again! Marching to City Hall to address the problems with housing in this city, and let them know how defective of an institution it is. Did you know that Rochester has more abandoned, foreclosed or simply unoccupied houses, than it has ever had homeless people? What about that Rochester has slum lords, and the city does nothing about it, even though they hold onto abandoned and underutilized properties as investment, evict rent-paying tenants, and try to sell the houses for a profit? Or that it is illegal in parts…

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