Max Leonard on the secret geography of cities

And I want to kind of double down on something that's gonna be a theme throughout this, 'cause it has to be, which is the illegality.

Why do you think the illegality of it is something that almost jumps to the forefront of our minds when we consider this activity, this hobby, this pastime, this exploration? Why do we focus so much on the illegality, and how much of it is that a part of it for you?

Hmm.

I think the, the framing of the, of, of illegality as the kind of primary kind of marker in urbex is, it's unfortunate really.

Um, I think it's the thing most people jump to, um, because it's exciting.

The same people, the same reason people wanna like, you know, listen to true crime podcasts or like read about gangsters and all, all this kind of stuff.

People like to, um, kinda latch onto the transgressive because it's kind of easy and it's quite a cheap thing.

Now, the, the illegality of it, in fact, you know, it's, it's different in different places.

In fact, in the UK we have a really interesting, um, a, a really interesting kind of state of our trespass law, which is quite peculiar to this country, which means that like a lot of urbex isn't actually illegal.

People just think it is, and there's something that kinda rubs up against the constitution of what it means to be British, that it annoys people a lot, but it's not actually illegal.

Um, because in the UK we have civil trespass, right? And it's not like the US where they have criminal trespass and a lot of other kind of European countries.

So there's this kind of, um, the, but, but it does, there's something about it that annoys people.

And if you, like, go on YouTube and do urbex, I actually did it this morning just to see what the state of the nation is today, and it's a mix of kind of daredevil, "Oh my God, we went to do this thing, you'll never guess what happened," to, "We got busted, maybe going to jail," like really playing off that and then like daredevil stuff like, you know, kids in Manhattan like doing like, uh, pull-ups on the end of construction cranes and that kind of thing.

Um, all of them really playing off the danger, outlaw, outsider thing.

But to me, like urban exploration in its purest form is like the fact that it's illegal gives it some of its magic indirectly, but that's not the reason that I, that I go and do it.

And so what I mean by that is, and this is to try and kind of tie this up, the fact that it's illegal or, or like people don't want you to do it, means that there is kind of a, there's a human element to the game, right? So unlike a mountain, I've climbed a lot of mountains and stuff and that's, that's great.

The mountain doesn't really care if you're there or not, right? It's a mountain.

It's really a battle with yourself.

In urban exploration, there's a kind of a battle with the security guards, the people who make the fences and alarms and sensors, and it becomes like a cross between a physical act of exploration like mountaineering or caving and a game of chess or something where there's a human adversary, and that's what makes it so, it's kind of a delightful combination.

Yeah.

That's very interesting.

I mean, you've answered so many of my questions there really succinctly.

Why, why does it irritate you that it's categorized as a daredevil activity and that's what the public latch onto?

Because so much of it is preposterously easy Right? If you go and talk to like a real, um, exploratory cave diver and go, "Oh, I like, I climbed up a construction crane, and it was really dangerous." They'll just look at you like, "What are you talking about, man?" Like, you know, when you...

A- and like I said, I've done a lot.