![]() ![]() However, state governments–with their long history of enforcing property laws–are better suited to regulate most other aspects of commercial drone operations. Many aspects of commercial drone regulation belong at the federal level, including drone manufacturing standards, remote identification and tracking system requirements, and laws that prohibit drone operations near borders, security sites, airports, or within the navigable airspace where manned aircraft fly. State governments could play vital roles in promoting property-based approaches to drone routing. Millions of individual landowners would directly share in the new economic value created by drone delivery technologies, rather than concentrating most of that value in a handful of wealthy corporations. Such systems are already technologically feasible and would leverage market forces to more efficiently balance drone-related airspace uses with landowners’ uses of that space. Landowners should be able to voluntarily license their low airspace on a per-use basis to collectively form temporary routes for autonomous commercial drone flights. There is still time to embrace an alternative approach that would respect, rather than undermine, landowners’ long-held airspace rights. Drone delivery companies seem confident that if they expand incrementally and emphasize the convenience of having pizzas and prescription drugs flown to our doorsteps, landowners won’t lament the loss of privacy and property rights. Over the past few years, Amazon, UPS, Alphabet’s Wing Aviation LLC, and others have secured FAA Part 135 air carrier designations authorizing commercial drone delivery operations that cover small geographic areas but still disregard the airspace exclusion rights of the underlying landowners involved.Īlthough most of these pilot programs initially allow drone deliveries only within a few remote locations, the FAA is already beginning let drone carriers like Walmart expand their operations–and their attendant safety risks and noise–into major suburban areas. ![]() ![]() In response to these policy setbacks, drone delivery companies have more recently adopted a less conspicuous strategy for acquiring private airspace rights that is flying under the radar of most property owners. This effort also failed after the model statute drew strong opposition from the American Bar Association’s Real Property Section for contravening existing property laws. Unable to convince Congress to broadly preempt state property laws, industry groups next tried to push a drone-friendly uniform law through state legislatures. Recognizing that landowners’ airspace exclusion rights could interfere with drone deliveries, powerful companies have spent the past decade lobbying aggressively for policies that would ignore those rights. ![]() The Court reiterated this fact just last year, adding that landowners’ rights to exclude are not an “empty formality… subject to modification at the government’s pleasure.” A recent Michigan case even directly applied this principle to drones, finding that because “rones fly below what is usually considered public or navigable airspace … flying them at legal altitudes over another person’s property without permission or a warrant would reasonably be expected to constitute a trespass.” Most commercial drones are designed to fly within 500 feet of the ground, below the typical navigable airspace line. The Supreme Court has likewise made clear that landowners are entitled to keep unwanted intrusions out of this space, affirming over 75 years ago property rights in the “immediate reaches” of space directly above parcels and that unwelcome “invasions of it are in the same category as invasions of the surface.” Property law is replete with rules that recognize landowners’ rights in this low airspace, from condominium laws to the laws governing overhang easements. It’s only a matter of time until these companies seek federal authority to route low-flying drones directly over your home-even if you object.Ĭommercial delivery drones fly within a few hundred feet of the ground through space that landowners have historically controlled. ![]()
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