Unemployment

[kandrathe]

Funny. Some would say that land ownership rights are just that - ownership rights. You can treat your land as you would treat your house, to live in, rent out, or demolish as you see fit. That's what liberty is, right? The ability to do what you want with what's yours, free of interference?

I was thinking back to our discussion about Pete's right to live peacefully in his neighborhood. If one neighbor is frequently having loud parties all night, and filling the road with a traffic jam, and generally disrupting the peacefulness of the neighborhood, then what manner of jurisprudence should hold sway? There is a social dynamic in the US/Canada that is different than other places I've visited in the world. In most places, we are very transient in where we live, and so we don't really have a very cohesive notion of village. It happens frequently that property changes ownership, and the owner's land use does not conform to what the "village" members expected. Whether that be an obnoxious loud party animal, the collector of junk cars, or the multi-national who wants to tear down the houses and put in a mini-mart.

I've been involved in a popular movement within my local community which is resisting modernization of our roads (curbs, gutters, sidewalks, street lights, etc.), high density development, and maintaining a precedent of 1 acre minimum lot size (many are bigger). While there are fewer residents, the tax base remains stable, the home prices remain higher, and the amount of services required remains lower.