Traditional urban ascents

I have a fantasy of walking down an alley and stumbling upon a splitter that goes up the side of an old building that would take gear, running home and grabbing my rack and possibly nabbing a first trad ascent in downtown Seattle. I’m sure it’s a pipe dream but thought I’d throw it out there. Anyone done something like this in their city? Know someone that has? Any wild and out there geared urban ascents that you know of? If so, please regale me with your or your friend’s endeavors.

At the UW there were some face climbs on the chiseled limestone blocks.  As well as some concrete cracks on the classroom building.

Looks like they have been posted
https://www.mountainproject.com/route/109277818/higher-education

Nice! When you said UW, I thought university of Washington here in Seattle. There is a buildering guidebook out there for u of Washington that exists...

https://www.mountainproject.com/photo/113790893

Dan Schoo wrote: I have a fantasy of walking down an alley and stumbling upon a splitter that goes up the side of an old building that would take gear, running home and grabbing my rack and possibly nabbing a first trad ascent in downtown Seattle. I’m sure it’s a pipe dream but thought I’d throw it out there. Anyone done something like this in their city? Know someone that has? Any wild and out there geared urban ascents that you know of? If so, please regale me with your or your friend’s endeavors.

Though you can probably do well just scouting on your own, you could also get a copy of Jeff Smoot's new book "Pumping Concrete". The book is mainly about artificial outdoor climbing walls in the Seattle area, but he has some stuff about buildings as well. He might be giving a book talk soon at the VW Seattle. 

Grew up in Kansas and "buildering" was all we had. Took it up a notch and did a couple multi pitches up some parking garages in our college town. I've hung out on the UW campus and run a couple solo laps up "Higher Education." Definitely the most classic urban climb I've ever done.

https://www.mountainproject.com/route/109277818/higher-education

You can place gear and get a belay if you feel like it, but I would treat any of this as soloing, not trad climbing, as I doubt any pro placed in concrete would hold.

Is concrete much different than sandstone?

Randy leavitt developed leavitation in a parking garage. I believe others in LA worked some of those cracks as well

https://www.instagram.com/p/Bp7e0U5hUpo/?utm_source=ig_share_sheet&igshid=10ccwoqskn6q2

This was a perfect finger crack at the stadium at the U of I in Urbana-Champaign. The year was 1987, so I don't know if it still exists.

They are out there.. you will find one! There are always expansion joints worthy of a Grade V urban ascent.. the trick is getting past the "safety" blocks on the first floor.. and not getting caught on the exit. We used to find all kinds of cracks and routes on the retaining walls around Berkeley when I was in College. I remember a crack in a ceiling in a parking garage.. nice hands, took #2.5 friends (the original ones) with ease. we dubbed it Parking Lot Reality.. the cops were not amused by our nocturnal attempts.

Stanford had lots of climbs on the buildings since whole campus used sandstone blocks for the buildings. One boulder problem in particular I recall had to be done with care else you put your foot through the Deans office window/

Apparently the CN tower in Toronto Canada takes #1s in between each pane on the elevator shaft ;) still awaiting a canadian ascent 

Ty Gilroy wrote: Apparently the CN tower in Toronto Canada takes #1s in between each pane on the elevator shaft ;) still awaiting a canadian ascent 

I dunno that head wall looks pretty imposing.

There’s an entire guidebook for LA Buildering. I own a copy. It’s interesting but the additional urban grade relating to rent-a-cops takes part of the fun out of day dreaming with the text

​http://www.supertopo.com/climbing/thread.php?topic_id=837458&msg=837458​​​

Ted Pinson wrote: You can place gear and get a belay if you feel like it, but I would treat any of this as soloing, not trad climbing, as I doubt any pro placed in concrete would hold.

Your assumption is wrong. Most concrete is stronger than what people whip on all day at Indian Creek.

Its been done before
Great thread/read:
http://www.supertopo.com/climbers-forum/440403/The-NIght-Climbers-of-Cambridge

Dr Strangelove wrote:

Your assumption is wrong. Most concrete is stronger than what people whip on all day at Indian Creek.

Huh...that’s interesting.  You wouldn’t expect cams to shear out?

Matt Himmelstein wrote: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9U0tDU37q2M

One of my favorites!!

Ted Pinson wrote:

Huh...that’s interesting.  You wouldn’t expect cams to shear out?

Concrete is strongest in compression loading and reasonably strong in shear. It has so little tension capacity that we use a value of "0" for most calculations. I would be surprised if the behavior of stone is very different. Also, use of unreinforced concrete in building applications is pretty rare. 

Source: I kinda paid attention in grad school