51–60 of 189 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
how is "a fair distance" specified?
They may not be citing specific law, but instead generally describing the spirit of a broad set of such laws.
fair to me means "not one inch across my property line"
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Quoted post unavailable.
No, what’s “ugly behavior” is posting FUD . > The vast majority of people don't have inhabited buildings in their back yards. If a building is uninhabited, the yard attached to it is hardly “my backyard”, as ‘bergenty’ wrote.
In cases where the only way to access a parcel of public land is through private land then an easement should be created. If a road or trail can't be built for whatever reason then a sign with an arrow should be the rule.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I hesitate to engage with this comment, but this 'method' is the same that was used by the hunters with the ladder. The sticking point is that, sure, they're not stepping foot in the corner-adjacent lots, but they are still crossing into the property via the air. This would be the same issue with the helicopter. Consider a property line not just a line on the ground, but an invisible wall extending from that line on…
The FAA has defined “navigable airspace” here: https://www.faa.gov/air_traffic/publications/atpubs/pham_htm... That cites another FAR, 91.119: https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/14/91.119 which lays out the general rules for fixed wing traffic and some exceptions for helicopters. Over most unpopulated areas, it’s 500’ from surface, structures, vehicles, or people, unless lower is needed for takeoff and landing.
It'd be interesting to know what tech stack OnX is using to achieve their outcomes. Looks pretty slick!
They started as a Detroit-only grassroots effort called "Why don't we own this?", tracking property auctions and helping locals buy adjacent parcels when they came available.
But quickly they realized this data was powerful once it was easy to access. Which was no mean feat -- every locality has their own terrible way to store parcel data, it seems, and it's a ton of work to gather and unify it. But once they've done that work, they can charge a bit to access it in scriptable and exportable ways, but the browser interface remains free.
Personally I think the government should just fund the operation and make all the access free, because this is fundamentally everyone's data, and unifying it should be the government's job. But in the meantime, I've never found myself needing more than the free access.
A number of European countries have "freedom to roam". It would be nice if America had an equivalent, but given how lobbying works that seems impossible at this point. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_to_roam
I wouldn’t want that in the US. We have more than enough national public land where people are free to roam. The last thing I want is some random camping in my backyard. We are a very individualistic people, I don’t want people in my little nation state.
Story: A regional gov agency bought a large tract of land behind my home for conservation. A fireline was cut all around the edge of the tract and lined with a 4' wire fence that ran adjacent to our properties. Homeowners were unitedly happy the land wouldn't be developed but some were upset it was now available for public daytime use.
Two disgruntled neighbors in particular stand out. One was a new mom who was alone all day and was unsettled with folks hiking past her backyard. The other was a generally cantankerous old guy who felt his right of privacy ought to extend far into land that wasn't his.
Whenever my kids and I hiked the fireline, we made a point of venturing away from the alone-mom's property but didn't extend the same courtesy to the old guy. Though we had a right to walk any part of the tract we wanted, we found respecting alone-mom's concerns was worth the effort.
My moral here is that demanding every last nanometer of rights - while rejecting all notions of consideration - is usually too absolutist to be productive. When conflicting desires are in play, I feel consideration+efficiency leads to more workable agreements.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
No, what’s “ugly behavior” is posting FUD . > The vast majority of people don't have inhabited buildings in their back yards. If a building is uninhabited, the yard attached to it is hardly “my backyard”, as ‘bergenty’ wrote.
Quoted post unavailable.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's not correct in the slightest - landowners do not control the airspace above their property. That's why municipalities can't ban the use of drones, just their launching and control from their territory. Even the national park service, which tries to restrict aircraft as much as possible, can only regulate in this way (and to prevent harassing wildlife). I have a commercial drone license.
Landowners generally control the air above their land to some certain limit, which is why you can fly your drone at 2000' elevation over their land but not necessarily 10' elevation over their land.
There is no specific rule against flying even 1 foot above ground over someone else's property, though it's very unlikely that doing so would not violate other rules unrelated to airspace. These include operating a drone unsafely, violating laws against harassment, and photography in a context where someone would have a reasonable expectation of privacy.
Public land is lovely until you have vagrancy problems as well. I live around conservation land near a major suburb and the number of loiterers, trespassers, and poachers you get is way more than you expect. When you are close to the city, the relative isolation becomes a real home invasion risk. Privacy and respect for property and boundaries is a very regional value, and attitudes against something as obvious as littering just aren't universal either. The corner crossing case in the article where there is some tendentiously legal loophole is really an example of people lacking respect for property and going where they explicitly aren't welcome. Nobody has a problem with people coming to appreciate nearby public land, but use and abuse of it without any value or contribution to the surrounding community is a problem. Instagram has become an utter cancer that way, where people drive into your driveway to take a picture, and then you get 10 others showing up because they want the same location. Someone who demonstrates that lack of respect for privacy and property should be incentivized to do so with whatever imposed cost is adequate, imo.