Sealing off beaches

[doodle]

Interesting situation happening with some beaches in America where rich people essentially barricade access to beach with their property lines creating what is essentially a private beach for themselves...

http://www.cnbc.com/id/101957304

[barrett]

From the article:

...Vinod Khosla, a green energy billionaire with ties to President Obama, is fighting surfers over access to a beach south of San Francisco.

Now that is a strange juxtaposition of words. I guess he wants to save the planet but only so that he can use it?

[dualstow]

Interesting. I hadn't heard of the David Geffen case before, or Khosla's, but I saw something similar about an actress whom I like. Same deal, blocking precious access to the public but I think it was trails, not beaches.

Don't they have a word in Swedish that translates to "every man's right" that refers to a law that people can pass through your property as long as they respect it? Something like that.

My folks used to have a piece of property on a lake. People showed up to fish right next to the dock when I was sitting there, getting ready to swim. I left them alone and waited til they were done before jumping in the water. Hunters came to hunt on the same land, further back, and we let them via the ASK program.

[barrett]

Dualstow, that Swedish word is Allemansrätten. Ah, the power of Google. There is also the German word Jedermannsdurchgangerlaubnis, but I just made that one up.

My new strategy for finding what is going on in the world is to just Google your tag lines. I now have an extremely eclectic but rather limited view of current events.

[dualstow]

LOL! I'll try to keep you busy and interested in weeks to come, then.

[WildAboutHarry]

Along California's 1,271 mile coast, from San Diego to the foggy coves near the Oregon border, there are more than 1,150 access points, or nearly one per mile, meaning points where the public is supposed to be able to reach the beach. They range from state parks to stairways to narrow sand paths. In areas where the public has "historically used private property" to reach the shoreline, the state creates access points through that property via easement or purchase of a sliver of land. Otherwise, the public is not supposed to cross private property.

This is really pretty simple.  If the state owns the land, or rights to use private land via easement, a beach access point can be created.  If the landowner who granted the easement does not honor the terms of the easement (or their successors do not), then the state (or the easement grantee) needs to enforce said rights.  Like in the Geffen case.  Note that long-standing unauthorized use may create a prescriptive easement, which is why all of this kind of thing usually ends up in court.  Which sounds like what is happening in the Khosla case.

Private property is private property.  Poor surfers, but there have also been incidents where the "public" were urinating, picnicking, and otherwise trespassing on private beach-front property.  The state has an obligation to protect access via state lands and easements, but an equal obligation to protect private property rights. 

Don't they have a word in Swedish that translates to "every man's right" that refers to a law that people can pass through your property as long as they respect it? Something like that.

The word over here is trespass.

[dualstow]

...
Private property is private property.  Poor surfers, but there have also been incidents where the "public" were urinating, picnicking, and otherwise trespassing on private beach-front property.  The state has an obligation to protect access via state lands and easements, but an equal obligation to protect private property rights. 

If I recall correctly, I think that was part of the case of the actress or singer mentioned above. At least part of the public were making a mess and causing destruction, while the owner was taking good care of the land.

Don't they have a word in Swedish that translates to "every man's right" that refers to a law that people can pass through your property as long as they respect it? Something like that.

The word over here is trespass.

Haha, true!

[Pointedstick]

I think it's a really good point about owners vs outsiders.

In societies with traditions of demarcating land as private, it's usually the case that the owners of the land are better stewards of it than outsiders with no personal or financial stake in keeping it in good condition. Without such incentives, the only thing that would make them respect said land would be cultural traditions of respecting and sustaining un-owned land, which we don't have in our culture. Frankly, most remaining human cultures don't have this, because the ones with the "private property" meme were stronger and outcompeted the others, in the same way as the ones with the "government" meme outcompeted the informal tribal societies and those with the "agriculture" and "masonry" memes outcompeted the nomads.

[doodle]

I think most surfers have a respect for nature though....what struck me about this article is that it would theoretically be possible for people with waterfront property to totally close off all beaches to Americans by not allowing them to cross their property.....in other words expropriating land by circling the wagons so to speak

[Pointedstick]

I think most surfers have a respect for nature though....what struck me about this article is that it would theoretically be possible for people with waterfront property to totally close off all beaches to Americans by not allowing them to cross their property.....in other words expropriating land by circling the wagons so to speak

Isn't that what the public access easement is supposed to prevent? And if the landowners are violating the easement they agreed to when they purchased their land, than, as WAH said, the state needs to enforce that and make them keep it open. This seems like it ought to be a pretty clear-cut case… what am I missing here?

[Pointedstick]

Isn't that what the public access easement is supposed to prevent? And if the landowners are violating the easement they agreed to when they purchased their land, than, as WAH said, the state needs to enforce that and make them keep it open. This seems like it ought to be a pretty clear-cut case… what am I missing here?

the owners are the wealthy/famous and elite, and the rules don't apply to them...

That sounds like a pretty good summation of the entirety of human history.

[doodle]

I think my point was just to show how complicated the idea of property rights can get....and how one can use their property rights to essentially defacto take over other property that they never purchased. Absent a government intervening, it is perfectly conceivable that a rich beachfront neighborhood could close off the ocean to everyone by creating a property border between the two.

[Pointedstick]

I think my point was just to show how complicated the idea of property rights can get....and how one can use their property rights to essentially defacto take over other property that they never purchased. Absent a government intervening, it is perfectly conceivable that a rich beachfront neighborhood could close off the ocean to everyone by creating a property border between the two.

Actually, I think you have it backwards: the people who never purchased the land they are trying to de facto take over are the surfers and beachgoers, not the property owners.

I don't really think it's very complicated at all. Property owners purchased this land knowing that there were easements to let non-paying members of the general public pass through. It is the job of the government to enforce this such that the agreement is fair to both parties; the government (theoretically) prevents the land-owners from violating their property deed by obstructing their easements, and it also punishes people who pollute or otherwise damage the land-owners' land during their travels through it.

If the government isn't doing those things, it is violating its own "social contract" to enforce these types of rules... which of course it always does, explaining why both parties are angry. The beach-goers have not been meaningfully prevented from polluting land they don't own and aren't responsible for, and the property owners haven't been meaningfully prevented from sealing off their right of access in response.

[WildAboutHarry]

Nearly all of the California coast is available for the public to enjoy (military bases probably don't count).  Easements grant rights (or, looked at another way, the land owner gives up rights) to an individual or group that does not own the property.  So easements that allow access to the beach (whether recorded or prescriptive) require the grantee to be vigilant.  Just like a landowner is expected to be vigilant over the use of their property so that a prescriptive easement situation does not develop.  Note that the state has the power to condemn lands for public purposes, so a beach access point can be developed that way as well (I don't know if that has ever happened, but I would be surprised if it had not).

Many, many years ago (early 1970s, I think) one of my geography professors ran a continuing study of an unregulated beach in California (I don't recall the name, unfortunately, but I don't think it was thisbeach).  At this beach there was no trash pick-up, and my professor would count the individual items of litter (cigarette butts, ring-top pull tabs, bottles, dog crap) and other bits of beach detritus.  He also interviewed the users of that beach, i.e. why did they use this beach when other, cleaner beaches were available.  My recollection is that the "trash beach" users enjoyed the freedom afforded by a no-rules beach.  And no, it was not clothes-optional.

[dualstow]

I was thinking about clothing-optional beaches when TripleB was railing against limitations in FarmerD's 'getting away from it all' European vacation thread. I have a vivid memory of a cop in a black jeep shouting 'put your top on' to a French tourist in Key West, FL. She was too cute to be covered up.

[WildAboutHarry]

[quote=dualstow]I have a vivid memory of a cop in a black jeep shouting 'put your top on' to a French tourist in Key West, FL. [/quote]

I assume the bottom was already in place?

Love, absolutely love, the new sig.