Hacker News Reader

> The usual approach in the US is for the land conservation foundations to split up the ownership rights between two different local organizations in a way that prevents developing the land without agreement from both organizations.

What a clever approach!

View on HN

In the 1980s, to get around compulsory purchase orders able to take land from even the most determined charity, campaigners split up a field into a few thousand small parcels, sold on for a pound or two. The idea being that trying to get them all back would be unaffordable, even the most corrupt charity would be unable to sell the land.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alice%27s_Meadow

Also sounds quite clever!

It works until one of them stops caring. I could imagine that, if a town is dying, it would be very difficult for them to justify spending resources related to nature conservation, and would then again require the conservation foundation to step in and provide resources.

I think the point is that both have to stop caring for the land to be developed. A kind of two phase commit. Also helps in case one of them becomes defunct.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com