[polairscience]

This is so false I can't even begin to describe it. And I say this as someone who nearly daily wanders around National Forest near his house.

First, why would it hurt to codify land access in a clearer way. And second. There are continuous battles with private landowners of where and how to access the public lands that you claim mean we don't need traditional paths or easements. See the recent Wyoming corning crossing case.

There are some public lands within a 5 minute walk of my house that I cannot access because rich landowners have intentionally cordoned them off. They're beautiful areas that should remain public. Why should you be able to effectively buy public land by restricting access to it maliciously? Why shouldn't Americans take seriously access to our shared land resources?

[rafram]

I don't think we really disagree. We should have better laws preventing landowners from restricting access to public land, and we should have laws explicitly allowing things like corner-crossing. But these are mostly issues in areas of public land that border developed areas. Since the vast majority of public land in this country is freely accessible to everyone via public roads that can't be blocked by private landowners, there's never really been enough political will to do large-scale land access reform like they did in the UK.

Again, over 90% of UK land is private, and large land barons control the vast majority of that. We just don't have a similarly widespread issue with land access in the US.

[gnarcoregrizz]

Yeah same thing happens around here. A dude here bought some land which surrounded an old popular access road to Cleveland national forest (socal), and promptly put a gate up... For a while it was the only convenient way to drive into the mountains from riverside county. Alternative routes were either closed from fires, closed to vehicles, or located on the other side of the mountain range. Lots of Facebook drama between this guy and people in the area trying to access the national forest. He has a camera pointed at the gate and regularly posts altercations and threatens to shoot people.

[potato3732842]

I don't get why people do those sorts of things. If you own land your #1 enemy is the government. In that situation it behooves you to do things to endear yourself to the community, your neighbors, etc.