Those of you who know me will know that I've spent the last year living and working in Abu Dhabi, and that I've been deliberately cautious about posting much at all to do with exploring. There are various reasons why discretion has felt like the wisest course of action, but I'll expand on that in a moment.
Since I now find myself about to leave here and return home, I thought I might put together a post of what I've been getting up to and a bit of background about the city. The only posts I've seen anywhere for AD have been either Mustang Wanted or Vitaliy and Vadim, which have been flying visits to cherry pick a couple of the higher rise projects before promptly leaving again.
It becomes quite a different scenario when you are here as an expat..
The first thing I did, before I had even left the UK was try to look into UAE trespass law. There wasn't anything specific that I could find, just news reports of convictions..
I found another report where a worker raped a housemaid but was sentenced for trespass instead!
So, it seems that the authorities take a pretty dim view of trespassing. There is also the fact that they appear to be able to make the law up as they feel where non Emiratis are concerned.
What is sure is that if caught you're looking at prison time, fines and deportation, and that's only as long as the buildings owners don't decide that you've offended their honour and proceed to sue you for more money that you'll ever earn.
The next thing to consider is the security situation in the city-
The following are quotes from The National, the main UAE paper, and are from 2011 and 2012 respectively.
So they have as near as is possible 100% cctv coverage of the city externally and public buildings have internal cctv which is viewable directly by the Ministry of Interior, or the UAE security services.
In order to work in the UAE you are required to have an Emirates ID card, which involves all kinds of checks, measurements and biometrics. They take complete hand prints for both hands, biometric facial measurements (remember that facial recognition soft wear the cctv is equipped with?) retinal scans and blood samples. Then round it off by asking for names and addresses of relatives at home.. I doubt there is any kind of extradition treaty with Ukraine, while there definitely is with the UK.
Best proceed with caution then.
When I first arrived I set about looking at what was going to be possible, Most people when you say Abu Dhabi immediately envisage Dubai with it's endless supertalls. After all, Abu dhabi is the capital of the UAE and produces over 50% of the GDP. It's going to be like Dubai on steroids right?
Actually no. Abu Dhabi is probably about 10-15 years behind Dubai in terms of urban development. There are some huge buildings, and I'll say now that after failing at them all more than twice I wasn't going to go near them again, nothing particularly bad happened and there was never police involvement; but as above, discretion is key here.
Failures.
335m, 374m and 324m respectively. Good luck with those.
Construction sites are basically a no-go out here, they operate 24hrs a day and have an absolute army of what are practically slave labourers, they still employ the labour camps that caused such a controversy in Dubai. Workers can be packed into tiny buildings with no amenities at all.
This means that they often prefer to sleep on the sites where they are working, I've often found sleeping areas in the dead spaces inside buildings here. Obviously this increases your chances of being caught massively, the workers are going to be occupying exactly the same spaces that you want to use to move round a site. On one occasion I climbed over a site hoarding, jumped down and almost landed on a couple of workers sleeping behind it.
This is actually a goods lift, turned into a rest room by the workers, complete with power and a cardboard box mattress.
Plant rooms and dead spaces-
I didn't just arrive and immediately start looking upwards though, being as I am particularly fond of industry I started by investigating what there was in terms of manufacturing. I'll just say it was a short search. There is almost no manufacturing here at all, and when there is anything it is on the scale of a small shop. There are no factories and there is no industrial heritage whatsoever. Bear in mind, before the discovery of oil in the 1950s Abu dhabi's industry was pearl diving.
I did find a small power station, where I sat and tortured myself listening to the turbines spinning a few times.. i didn't bother trying to get inside.
There is apparently a fairly extensive system of drains and sewers under the city too, the picture below doesn't really convey the scale well, but the lid is probably 1.5m square and made out of one solid piece of cast iron.
No. Just no.
There are also plenty of smaller round lids, which also look to be impossible to lift on your own. I was actually told by some workers that these require twisting as well as lifting to open, so the might even employ a bayonet type of fitting. They might also only be tight fitting, but either way, remember that cctv coverage?
By now it was starting to look like the only option for exploring in Abu Dhabi was indeed rooftops, which as I've already said have to be approached carefully..
The city is midway through a 25 year urban development plan, which has lead to the demolition of many of the older mid-rise buildings at 10-15 stories.
To begin with I concentrated on these mainly, working on the assumption that no one would care about a strange foreigner taking photos of old buildings.
Since I now find myself about to leave here and return home, I thought I might put together a post of what I've been getting up to and a bit of background about the city. The only posts I've seen anywhere for AD have been either Mustang Wanted or Vitaliy and Vadim, which have been flying visits to cherry pick a couple of the higher rise projects before promptly leaving again.
It becomes quite a different scenario when you are here as an expat..
The first thing I did, before I had even left the UK was try to look into UAE trespass law. There wasn't anything specific that I could find, just news reports of convictions..
UAE jails Pinay maid for letting delivery man trespass in employer's home
July 5, 2014 1:46pm
A United Arab Emirates court has sentenced a Filipina maid to a month in jail for allowing a Pakistani man to trespass in her employer's house, a UAE news site reported Friday.
According to a report by Dubai-based Khaleej Times, the maid, who did not appeal the verdict, will be deported once she serves her sentence.
However, the UAE appellate court imposed a fine of Dh2,000 on the Pakistani, 24.
Initially, the Court of Misdemeanors sentenced the Pakistani to a month in jail and deportation, for trespassing into the house of the Filipina maid's employer in Jebel Ali.
But the Pakistani's lawyer said there was no criminal intent on his client's part.
The lawyer said the Pakistani works in an electronics repair shop, and went to that house to deliver a smart tablet.
“My client went inside the house to deliver the tablet to the maid, his alleged accomplice, who was not allowed by her sponsor to leave the house. There was no robbery, no illicit sex and no trespassing and both need their jobs so badly,†the lawyer said. — Joel Locsin/JDS, GMA News
I found another report where a worker raped a housemaid but was sentenced for trespass instead!
So, it seems that the authorities take a pretty dim view of trespassing. There is also the fact that they appear to be able to make the law up as they feel where non Emiratis are concerned.
What is sure is that if caught you're looking at prison time, fines and deportation, and that's only as long as the buildings owners don't decide that you've offended their honour and proceed to sue you for more money that you'll ever earn.
The next thing to consider is the security situation in the city-
The following are quotes from The National, the main UAE paper, and are from 2011 and 2012 respectively.
In Abu Dhabi, security experts estimate that half of all public places are monitored by cameras. They said the coverage would likely increase to 90 per cent of the capital by the third quarter of this year.
Last year, the capital announced its intention to build a Dh33 million network of surveillance towers that would be equipped with radar-enabled cameras linked to a central communications system. The project is intended to protect the emirate's critical infrastructure assets.
ABU DHABI // Crime-fighting in the capital is increasingly widening its scope with sophisticated closed-circuit television cameras. And while privacy is a concern, officials are focusing on their ability to deter lawbreakers.
As much as 90 per cent of Abu Dhabi island is expected to fall under the public eye within the next 18 months, according to security analysts. Abu Dhabi Municipality already has 153 outdoor closed-circuit (CCTV) cameras in the city centre, with 83 at junctions feeding live footage to traffic and police authorities. The rapid expansion of surveillance networks is expected to surpass even Dubai's systems by 2012.
The capital is mounting hundreds of new cameras along gateways into the city such as Airport Road, Muroor Road and Khaleej al Arabi Street. The new Al Salam expressway is also expected to be monitored. "I expect nearly 100 per cent of the city is going to be covered soon, but it will be in phases," said Amr Mustafa, the accounts manager for City-Tec, one of the country's largest surveillance providers.
Such cameras in Dubai and parts of Abu Dhabi already have face recognition software, in which unique facial measurements of passersby can be scanned to identify people as well as bring up passport records, according to industry sources
What happens is the Ministry of Interior can view any hotel camera from their control section at the [ministry] itself," said Mr Shaideen, "and what happens in the hotels will be sending the feed through a very high-end switch connecting to the ministry." He said he expected Abu Dhabi's security systems to be as advanced as Dubai's in the coming months. Le Méridien Hotel and the Sheraton Corniche were among the hotels that expanded their surveillance coverage recently
So they have as near as is possible 100% cctv coverage of the city externally and public buildings have internal cctv which is viewable directly by the Ministry of Interior, or the UAE security services.
In order to work in the UAE you are required to have an Emirates ID card, which involves all kinds of checks, measurements and biometrics. They take complete hand prints for both hands, biometric facial measurements (remember that facial recognition soft wear the cctv is equipped with?) retinal scans and blood samples. Then round it off by asking for names and addresses of relatives at home.. I doubt there is any kind of extradition treaty with Ukraine, while there definitely is with the UK.
Best proceed with caution then.
When I first arrived I set about looking at what was going to be possible, Most people when you say Abu Dhabi immediately envisage Dubai with it's endless supertalls. After all, Abu dhabi is the capital of the UAE and produces over 50% of the GDP. It's going to be like Dubai on steroids right?
Actually no. Abu Dhabi is probably about 10-15 years behind Dubai in terms of urban development. There are some huge buildings, and I'll say now that after failing at them all more than twice I wasn't going to go near them again, nothing particularly bad happened and there was never police involvement; but as above, discretion is key here.
Failures.
335m, 374m and 324m respectively. Good luck with those.
Construction sites are basically a no-go out here, they operate 24hrs a day and have an absolute army of what are practically slave labourers, they still employ the labour camps that caused such a controversy in Dubai. Workers can be packed into tiny buildings with no amenities at all.
This means that they often prefer to sleep on the sites where they are working, I've often found sleeping areas in the dead spaces inside buildings here. Obviously this increases your chances of being caught massively, the workers are going to be occupying exactly the same spaces that you want to use to move round a site. On one occasion I climbed over a site hoarding, jumped down and almost landed on a couple of workers sleeping behind it.
This is actually a goods lift, turned into a rest room by the workers, complete with power and a cardboard box mattress.
Plant rooms and dead spaces-
I didn't just arrive and immediately start looking upwards though, being as I am particularly fond of industry I started by investigating what there was in terms of manufacturing. I'll just say it was a short search. There is almost no manufacturing here at all, and when there is anything it is on the scale of a small shop. There are no factories and there is no industrial heritage whatsoever. Bear in mind, before the discovery of oil in the 1950s Abu dhabi's industry was pearl diving.
I did find a small power station, where I sat and tortured myself listening to the turbines spinning a few times.. i didn't bother trying to get inside.
There is apparently a fairly extensive system of drains and sewers under the city too, the picture below doesn't really convey the scale well, but the lid is probably 1.5m square and made out of one solid piece of cast iron.
No. Just no.
There are also plenty of smaller round lids, which also look to be impossible to lift on your own. I was actually told by some workers that these require twisting as well as lifting to open, so the might even employ a bayonet type of fitting. They might also only be tight fitting, but either way, remember that cctv coverage?
By now it was starting to look like the only option for exploring in Abu Dhabi was indeed rooftops, which as I've already said have to be approached carefully..
The city is midway through a 25 year urban development plan, which has lead to the demolition of many of the older mid-rise buildings at 10-15 stories.
Abu Dhabi Vision 2030
The UPC has developed the Abu Dhabi 2030 Urban Structure Framework Plan to optimize the city's development through a 25-year program of urban evolution. In doing so, it is laying the foundations for a socially cohesive and economically sustainable community that preserves the Emirate's unique cultural heritage. This foresight to plan for infrastructure ahead of time is a key example of a visionary governance.
Reflecting the dynamism and substance of this unique 'Next Generation Planning' mindset, the creation of an Abu Dhabi Vision 2030 brand identity brings together all the elements of this innovative approach, allowing the UPC to communicate the full scope of the plan to the Emirati communities.
To begin with I concentrated on these mainly, working on the assumption that no one would care about a strange foreigner taking photos of old buildings.