Keystone Pipeline Sparks Property Rights Concerns

Project would cut parcels in half, run roughshod over owners' preferences

IDAHO FALLS, Idaho – Bob Allpress, a farmer from the tiny Nebraska border town of Naper, isn't dead set against the Keystone XL Pipeline, though he wishes the company behind the project, TransCanada, would take it someplace else.

"We're not 100 percent against the pipeline," Allpress said. "If only it were sensibly located."

Allpress is just one property owner affected by the pipeline, a 36-inch oil conduit slated to run from eastern Alberta, Canada, to southern Texas oil refineries. He lives on more than 900 acres, ground he splits between crops – usually corn – and cows.

The pipeline, as it snakes through the ground, will also come within about 150 yards of his home. It will also come too close, he says, to a well that provides drinking water for his family and a few neighbors.

TransCanada wants to stick the pipeline right down the middle of his land, cutting the cropland and the pasture in half. The company, if it ever wins federal approval for the project, will take forever a 50-feet wide swath of land from Allpress, and an additional 60 feet span during construction to accommodate cranes, truck and digging equipment.

Comments

[SIV]

"cutting the cropland and the pasture in half"

He can still graze cows and plant crops on that 50' wide swath.They aren't taking title to the property, it is an easement. They are paying him well for it too. It isn't "forever". Many pipelines are abandoned .

[grey]

SIV, I would like to introduce you to Mr. Jack Shit. You and he know the same amount about pipeline easements. Right now it cuts through grazing and crops, later the owner could have other uses in mind. Someone could want to build a stadium, a nuclear power plant, or an alien landing pad in twenty years, but he can't sell it because the easement conflicts with construction. Good luck trying to get the company to relocate it later if you have a use that requires a relocation.

I said this elsewhere: A argument that the owner is not damaged by eminent domain or is not damaged very much is beside the point. Why does the government and a corporation get to decide how much damage it is okay to do to this individual? This is about the ethics of Eminent Domain. Does eminent domain comport with libertarian values, if so, what are it's limits?

This is the second thread and the eminent domain supporters have yet to address these core issue. Make some real arguments, I love the utility of the pipeline, but I keep hearing justifications and not reasoned arguments.

[grey]

I came across harsher than intended. But my point stands that we need an argument on the ethics and limits of Eminent Domain and not an evaluation of how much damage was done to the vitims.

[SIV]

This is actually a good article.

[AAnderson]

This is an excellent article--a citizen using his right to his property to fight off the corporate distortion of his land. More like these please.

Caveat: poor fella probably already has MTBE (specifically the water-soluble E) in his water from leaking gas wells.