>>4193391Probably because people do trespass to take photos, so even when they see someone with a camera who isn't *currently* doing anything stupid, they still assume you're *about* to do something stupid.
If you're a guy whose job is to keep crackheads and wayward teens out of an abandoned box factory in some ghetto somewhere, and you see someone stalking around the perimeter of your property with a camera, I can see how your first suspicion would be he's *about* to sneak in to get photos from inside the building.
With railroads, in particular, people risk getting hit by trains (and sometimes are) to take pictures like this.
This is why in most cities with an active railfan community, the railfans make themselves as known to the railroad as possible. There is usually a local FB group that has both railfans and actual train engineers in it.
For other non-railroad industry, there's not even that kind of relationship
Ironically I have found that if you actually *pass for homeless* you will become invisible, as everyone is so used to ignoring homeless that even cops and security guards sometimes do it. Homeless people don't gnerally lug around visible cameras though.
