Photography Banned in Downtown Silver Spring, Maryland

Talk about paranoia! This has just gone too far..........security staff telling people that a public street is in fact private and that they can't use a camera.

Get real!

from "nowpublic.com":
It's been said time and time again, to the point of becoming cliche: The world changed after 9/11. We have to accept new security restrictions. We have to be cautions, careful, questioning, even suspicious. But being stopped in the street for completely lawful activity is not only un-American, and possibly unlawful itself, but it's likely to be ineffective, even counter productive. Regarding photography as suspicious activity diverts valuable brain power away from thinking about real dangers. Besides, terrorists can photograph sites surreptitiously if they want.

So come on, anyone who lives in the Silver Springs area, there's a protest Details here scheduled for July 4th to draw attention to this issue.

from "dc.metbogs.com:
So let's test the theory. Wayan, Carl, myself and the rest of the DC Metblogs crew invite you out for a photo outing on what seems like the best day to do this: July 4th. We'll meet outside the Photo Interdiction Zone at Noon and take a stroll through "No Lens Land", take some pictures and see what happens. If we get arrested maybe Ms Goss will find us someone to represent us, pro bono. If not we'll at least raise a little awareness about private security interfering with public rights.

Who do they think they are? Should be fun on July 4th, wish I could be there to see their faces when cameras are flashing here, there and everywhere.

Next, they'll have you on charges of "looking at them in a suspicious and dangerous manner".

Some other interesting "no photography" stories from "boing boing.net":

Aussie mall defends its photons from terrorists

No taking pix of San Fran building from the sidewalk?

Spy museum bans photography

[edit on 22/6/2007 by nerbot]

I live near Silver Spring, and I can tell you there's nothing worth protecting in Silver Spring that would require a photography ban.

I wish I could be there, this has become a real problem for photog's all around the world. Especially in the field of aircraft spotting the security and police have gone haywire and repeatedly harass photog's and do illegal searches etc.

[Edit] The article doesn't mention anywhere if there are signs prohibiting photograpy, and if they dont exist the shoot away. After all you're not a psychic who knows where the public/private land begins.

[edit on 23/6/2007 by PsykoOps]

from sweatmonicaIdo:
I live near Silver Spring, and I can tell you there's nothing worth protecting in Silver Spring that would require a photography ban.

Stupid really then isn't it.

Why are they so paranoid and security conscious over nothing then?

[edit on 23/6/2007 by nerbot]

I live about a hour from Silver springs, but honestly their nothing but doctors offices and mental wards, lol and college park , which half of em are in girls gone wild so I doubt that they are doing nothing more here then trying for money somehow.

Im gonna go march up and down with a DVR and rock it! then when they tell me to go I will have another friend tape me, then when they have to go I will have another friend tape them all jumping out an taping the persons taking us away,

I will call it, the Million man video march.

We WILl Not Be Silenced. We Will invade with 1's and 0's

I love it "tranceopticalinclined", you certainly got to "stick it to em"!



Vive la revolution

To protest - get as many people as possible but take cameras without film and without batteries and pretend to take pictures. Drive them crazy as they make arrests but can go no further because no photography actually takes place.

Well how's this for people power.......

Silver Springs Photo Protest

from "nowpublic.com:
Over one hundred people marched today, July 4th, in support of first amendment rights in downtown Silver Spring, Maryland.

The demonstration was prompted by a ban on photography in a quasi-public, quasi-private street, Ellsworth Drive.

The Montgomery County, Maryland government leased Ellsworth Drive in Silver Spring for a dollar a year to a developer, the Peterson Company, giving that company the right to provide security and amenities to Ellsworth Drive, a formerly public street that runs through the heart of Silver Spring. The Peterson Company called Ellsworth Drive "private property" and prohibited photography.

Today's demonstration was a response to an incident that happened to Washington, DC area photographer Chip Py, who was told by a security guard that photography was barred on Ellsworth Drive. Chip Py and another area photographer, Kate Mereand, founded the Flickr Group, DC Photo Rights in response to this and other frequent incidents in the Washington, DC area: People, including professional photographers and tourists have been told by security guards that they can't take photographs, when, in fact, there are no laws barring photography.

Nice one

Catching up on old threads.
What happened here?
Still a ban in effect?

Oh, and how the hell can the government ''lease" public roads?
That seems very counterintuitive and unAmerican.