[HN Gopher] Belgian farmer accidentally moves French border
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Belgian farmer accidentally moves French border
Author : sleepyshift
Score : 238 points
Date : 2021-05-04 14:01 UTC (8 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.bbc.co.uk)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.bbc.co.uk)
| _the_inflator wrote:
| This is funny.
|
| Even funnier are the so-called line houses along the USA/Canada
| border: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Line_house
| iggldiggl wrote:
| I also found this (online) exhibition documenting the whole
| USA/Canada border rather interesting:
| http://www.clui.org/section/united-divide-a-linear-portrait-...
|
| Although from a European perspective, the post 9/11-state of
| that border also seems somewhat depressing...
| walrus01 wrote:
| Not only that, but due to limitations in 19th century surveying
| technology, the actual 49th parallel as measured by a high
| precision GPS+GLONASS+Galileo receiver is some dozens of meters
| different from where the practically enforced line is (such as
| zero avenue and its ditch in South Surrey/Langley, British
| Columbia where it meets Whatcom County, WA).
|
| If you go here and search for "B street, Blaine WA" and right
| click in google maps, look at the latitude, the actual 49th
| parallel is considerably south of what is enforced in practice.
| Much of Blaine, and a very long strip all the way to the great
| lakes, is actually in Canada...
|
| https://www.google.com/maps/place/B+St,+Blaine,+WA+98230,+US...
| smnrchrds wrote:
| The US-Canada border situation is more sad than funny in the
| post-9/11 world. I wish the borders were open between US and
| Canada as they are in Europe. But crossing the border, even
| though it is barely marked, is a serious crime and heavily
| enforced.
|
| https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/jogger-who-a...
| dmurdoch wrote:
| This is only true in certain places. For example, in the
| thousand islands, the border between US and Canada is VERY
| nebulous. A line on a map exists, but you can drive your boat
| around the islands, entering and exiting the US dozens of
| times, and absolutely nothing will happen to you. The US
| Coast Guard is there boating around watching, but only rarely
| pokes around peoples boats.
|
| Now I'm sure if you landed and somehow were talked to by the
| border police and didn't have a passport you'd be pretty
| screwed, but honestly thats pretty unlikely to happen. I know
| an old couple set in their ways who to this day just boat
| across the river sans passport for a favourite restaurant.
| thedanbob wrote:
| Reminds me of the dispute between Canada and Denmark over Hans
| Island: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans_Island#cite_ref-
| The_Post_...
| aetherspawn wrote:
| A neighbor once moved the pegs marking our block a few meters so
| that he could move (and claim) the neutral strip. The most
| irritating thing, is that he more or less got away with it
| because he was old and persistent. In fact, he gradually built
| infrastructure on it, despite hundreds of complaints to the local
| council and authorities. In the end the council couldn't come up
| with a good way to settle the dispute, so they offered to auction
| the neutral strip and its contents between us to the highest
| bidder.
| tinus_hn wrote:
| This all goes well just until it goes horribly wrong and you're
| forced to demolish everything you built.
| lb1lf wrote:
| ...or you encounter a bit of chainsaw diplomacy: (link in
| Norwegian, but the photos are quite telling.)
|
| https://www.vg.no/nyheter/innenriks/i/GkGJm/nabotvist-paa-
| ne...
| yosito wrote:
| I've heard many stories of property lines being moved simply by
| people moving a fence, mowing the grass, or building a
| structure. If no one has said anything in several years
| (exactly how many varies by jurisdiction, of course), the
| assumed property line can often become the legal property line.
| R0b0t1 wrote:
| In a lot of areas in the US (but not all) a period of notice
| is necessary. This precludes events where a neighbor steals
| property from another surreptitiously. In some cases if the
| land is "abandoned" you need to make the person who owns it
| aware of it, in others it is presumed if someone does not
| visit their land for 7 years they have no interest in it.
|
| (This is getting complicated and challenged due to the fact
| suburbs are popping up nearly everywhere and totally useless
| land may now be worth money.)
|
| In the case above simply demolish whatever the guy built. He
| tries to sue in civil court and fails because he had no right
| to build there.
| mrweasel wrote:
| That happened constantly in the Danish country side when I
| grew up. My dad and grandfather had to check up on one
| neighbor in particular pretty frequently, otherwise he grab
| half a meter of our field every other year or so.
|
| Despite not having lived on the farm for 25 year my mom and
| dad are often brought out to help settle dispute regarding
| property lines.
|
| Technically everything is mapped out and moving a post or
| plowing a wrong part of the field doesn't change ownership,
| but some of the maps are old and reference point are no
| longer where they once where.
| mschuster91 wrote:
| > In the end the council couldn't come up with a good way to
| settle the dispute, so they offered to auction the neutral
| strip and its contents between us to the highest bidder.
|
| Here in Germany, he would be issued a demolition order by the
| court that, in case of non-compliance, will be enforced even
| with armed police if deemed necessary. On top of that the
| affected party can sue him for damages.
| wil421 wrote:
| Sounds like the US. The Sheriff would come if the court
| issued an order. In my county you can get the survey if it
| has been done on the property. It's public records and
| details the property markers they found.
| mnw21cam wrote:
| In a lot of cases, the affected party is the local council
| (government) which often doesn't care (or doesn't have enough
| free time to care).
| oblio wrote:
| They don't really enforce it much in Romania, but when they
| do, same. I've seen stuff get bulldozed down.
| heavenlyblue wrote:
| Unfortunately people usually know how the enforcement happens
| in their countries and happily take advantage of the
| disfunctional authorities.
| macjohnmcc wrote:
| My father's uncle kept moving the fence between our property
| and his so he could drive to the back of his own property. This
| was an ongoing thing. I think eventually my father just gave up
| and let him have the strip. Now neither property is in the
| hands of family and no one will know unless a survey is done in
| the future.
| Turing_Machine wrote:
| In at least some jurisdictions, allowing someone to do this
| over a period of years can create an easement that has
| ongoing legal effect. You don't lose title to the land, but
| neither are you allowed to prohibit the neighbor from
| traveling over it.
| mytailorisrich wrote:
| Trespass is usually a civil matter and councils only deal with
| planning issues (at least here in the UK so I imagine also in
| Australia). So even if the land was the council's they could
| not do more than involving lawyers and going to court. They
| might have rightly concluded that it was not worth it for them
| to spend money on an useless piece of land and decided to sold
| it instead since there was obviously demand for it.
| jerf wrote:
| From what I've seen of several such issues in the US, this is
| not legal advice, but if it ever happens to you, you are well
| advised to A: hire out a surveyer or do whatever it takes to be
| absolutely sure you are correct before proceeding down this
| list B: issue notice to all the correct locations (to the
| violator and the relevant boards in charge of the lines) and
| then C: after a suitable, but not _too_ long period of time,
| take concrete action to remove the offending things. Hire a
| lawyer somewhere in the mix to be sure you 're not violating
| any other local laws. (I especially don't know what you should
| _do_ with the "offending things", e.g., can you take them
| yourself? Do you have to throw them back on the property line
| side? What if this involves a certain amount of demolition? I
| don't know.)
|
| I've seen a number of people in my extended social circles do
| varying combinations of A and B, but still eventually losing
| because of a failure to do C, because they don't want to be
| confrontational or whatever.
|
| (I am specifying "in the US" because I'm fairly sure this is
| related to common law. Countries operating under other
| traditions may not see this effect. However in common law,
| there's a certain element of having to be able to "defend" your
| property in order for it to be yours.)
| [deleted]
| autosharp wrote:
| > Belgian farmer accidentally moves French border
|
| So if the farmer takes the stone and tractors it to East Russia,
| did the farmer accomplish more than Napoleon?
| Bayart wrote:
| We shall retaliate by symbolically pouring beer into the gutter
| and stepping on fried potato chips in front of the Belgian
| embassy.
|
| (For the uninitiated
| https://www.wilsoncenter.org/publication/stabbing-oranges-an...)
| bigmattystyles wrote:
| But you've bought the beer and fries.
| js2 wrote:
| South Carolina and North Carolina didn't manage to get their
| border recorded accurately until a few years ago. After re-
| surveying, there were 1400 parcels impacted.
|
| https://www.wistv.com/story/13784677/dispute-over-north-caro...
|
| https://hutchenslawfirm.com/blog/creditors-rights/north-and-...
| nestorD wrote:
| There is such a stone marker in my parent's garden (their house
| is definitely fully in French teritory)!
|
| To be fair they are living so close to the frontier that my
| cellphone picks up the Belgian cell network in their house...
| yrgulation wrote:
| I cant' help but rejoice that europe's borders (at least within
| the eu) are a mere stone. Not too long ago moving that stone
| might have led to war, now it leads to jokes.
| berkes wrote:
| A related story is the border between Belgium and the
| Netherlands that was recently moved[1].
|
| Not because some war was imminent, but because of very
| practical reasons: Belgian police could only reach that piece
| of Belgium by boat; so "exchanging it with NL" was the easiest,
| because the Dutch police could just drive there.
|
| It makes me happy to see that we're down to "practical
| exchanges of land" from centuries of war over the most silly
| pole, church or "slight".
|
| [1] https://nos.nl/artikel/2112869-nederland-krijgt-belgisch-
| sch... Dutch only, sorry.
| FabHK wrote:
| Or the Whisky War over Hans Island, which the Canadians claim
| and leave a bottle of (Canadian) whisky, upon which the
| Danish claim it and leave a bottle of (Danish) snaps, ad
| infinitum.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whisky_War
| sangnoir wrote:
| What are the logistics regarding nationality and property
| within the exchanged land? Are the inhabitants now dutch, or
| Belgians who now own Dutch property?
| garmaine wrote:
| I don't know about this case, but typically this is
| uninhabited, unimproved land that is exchanged.
| the-dude wrote:
| Dutchie here, FTA :
|
| > wordt geklaagd over drugsoverlast, afval en
| naaktloperij
|
| So the actual problems are complaints about drug users,
| illegal trash dumping and nudism. And the negotiations
| only took 5 years.
| ParanoidShroom wrote:
| >And the negotiations only took 5 years.
|
| Yeaaaah I'm gonna point fingers to Belgium tho.
| sangnoir wrote:
| I had assumed that the land was occupied because the
| motivation for the exchange mentioned in the article are
| reports of crime (nudity, drugs) that Belgian police
| can't easily attend to. It is likely the suspects were
| visitors to the area.
| nob0dyasked wrote:
| Huge if true!
| Invictus0 wrote:
| Borders are shifting all the time based on how the water flows:
|
| [0]
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_international_border_r...
|
| [1]
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_river_borders_of_U.S._...
| bombcar wrote:
| Rivers are an incredibly convenient border and also incredibly
| flexible over time. "Go west until you hit the river" is easy
| to understand and convey, and when things are measured in
| square miles or local it doesn't really matter, but over time
| that river moves and the exactitude of the boundaries matter
| more and more.
| macintux wrote:
| My uncle argued such a case before the U.S. Supreme Court:
| the Ohio River is gradually migrating south into Kentucky, so
| more of that state is now on the Indiana side of the river.
| OldHand2018 wrote:
| Yes, but in some of those cases, the borders have been set
| while the water hasn't.
|
| Like this hilarity:
| https://www.google.com/maps/@37.1205633,-89.1155927,15z
| 317070 wrote:
| This is so ironic. There is already a movie (Rien a Declarer /
| Nothing to declare) whose main premise is a guy spending his
| nights slightly moving the border between France and Belgium:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q6MljTh0kws (This extract is
| French only unfortunately :( )
|
| Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=piQPaxlZWu4 (With
| English subtitles)
|
| But, as someone who grew up less than 100 meters from this
| border, I'm pretty sure this stuff actually happens all over.
| yumraj wrote:
| Thanks for sharing, the trailer and the clip before were very
| funny, saying as someone who probably knows just 2-3 words of
| French.
|
| Will have to see if it is streaming somewhere..
| gumby wrote:
| I have a friend who grew up in France (well, except for her
| kitchen which was in Belgium); she went to school in Belgium,
| crossing the border (which in those days had a gate) twice each
| day.
|
| I just imagine the guards opening the gate for a little girl
| with a school satchel. The bollards which held the gate are
| still there.
| starik36 wrote:
| > bollards
|
| I've never heard that word till I started playing GeoGuessr.
| elliekelly wrote:
| Have you considered moving them a few meters into France?
| Maybe your friend can squeeze in a Belgian living room, too.
| gumby wrote:
| These are serious bollards, and I think she'd rather move
| them into Belgium.
|
| Hmm, her husband is Belgian, if moving is involved you're
| right: he might want them to head into France.
|
| Perhaps they could each move one of them!
| dkarl wrote:
| What if they find the midpoint of the bollards and rotate
| them around this point 18o clockwise every night for ten
| nights?
| gumby wrote:
| Couldn't that risk cutting an ambiguous divot unmoored
| from either region? Might not be safe to step into such a
| zone once it developed. Could drift away into a different
| set of dimensions.
| nucleardog wrote:
| Sounds like the setup for some wacky sitcom hijinks.
|
| Marc is from Belgium, Emma is from France. When it came
| time to decide where to live, they couldn't come to an
| agreement so compromised and live on the border. But what
| they didn't know is that neither of them ever truly gave
| up the fight. Tune in for their late night heists and
| hijinks as they try to move into their preferred
| country... by moving the border! Fridays at 8pm on the
| WEB.
| gumby wrote:
| I certainly know two people who would watch that show.
| hellbannedguy wrote:
| Netflix will be in touch.
| NicoJuicy wrote:
| Just by curiosity, i grew up in Alveringem ( Belgium, about 30
| minutes from Dunkerque. Next to the French border) and still
| regularly go to Hondschote ( water :p ).
|
| Where did you grew up and are you still regularly there?
|
| Ps. If it's near, here's something unique about the
| neighborhood:
| https://www.google.com/amp/s/sniperinmahwah.wordpress.com/20...
| 317070 wrote:
| I grew up in Warneton/Waasten, but I live in London these
| days.
| 8ytecoder wrote:
| One of the most complex borders with hundreds of enclaves and
| people living there with no clear idea on which country they
| belong to used to be the India-Bangladesh border.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/India%E2%80%93Bangladesh_encla...
| gwright wrote:
| This is another interesting one. A part of Russia that sits
| on the Baltic Sea disconnected from Russia proper:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaliningrad_Oblast
| jacquesm wrote:
| One day that will cause a major geopolitical headache. And
| now every time I move around in that area it causes me a
| huge detour. Oh, and I ended up accidentally at the
| Belarussian border one day (note to self: update your
| satnav).
| mey wrote:
| Little video on that
| https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=r-aIzkvPwFo
| simondotau wrote:
| I don't even have to click the link to know that it's that
| episode of Map Men.
| aasasd wrote:
| Belgium has such a place of its own:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baarle-Hertog
|
| However India-Bangladesh has enclaves of a higher nesting
| order.
| athenot wrote:
| Wow this is crazy. But at the same time, it could be an
| interesting solution for other disputed borders around the
| world. Leaders are often obsessed with drawing a clean line
| between 2 areas but reality is a lot more messy and nuanced.
| ad404b8a372f2b9 wrote:
| Aaah I was going to post that :D! It stars one of my favorite
| comedic actors, Benoit Poelvoorde who is belgian. I'd encourage
| anyone with a taste for foreign films to check out "C'est
| arrive pres de chez vous" (Man Bites Dog in english) another
| great movie of his (features lots of violence and serious
| themes, not a family movie).
| smnrchrds wrote:
| > Benoit Poelvoorde
|
| It looks like a very French first name and a very Dutch last
| name. Is that common in Belgium? Is there a significant
| overlap between the linguistic communities of Belgium?
| zinclozenge wrote:
| It's kind of a meme in Belgium that flemish people have
| french last names and walloons have dutch last names.
| jacquesm wrote:
| That's also common in the Netherlands and even Germany.
| French first names are simply popular all throughout Europe
| (ditto Italian and English names).
| TacticalCoder wrote:
| > Is that common in Belgium?
|
| Jean-Claude Van Varenberg (the real name of Jean-Claude Van
| Damme). It is incredibly common. I've got many several
| french speaking belgian friends, with a french name but a
| dutch family name.
|
| > Is there a significant overlap between the linguistic
| communities of Belgium?
|
| I would say not anywhere near what the name / family names
| may suggest. The north/south separation in Belgium is quite
| clear and although mixed french/flemish couples are by not
| means rare, I'd say the overlap is still not huge. Even in
| Brussels native flemish speaking people are only 6% of the
| population.
| markvdb wrote:
| I initially started writing half an encyclopedia here, but
| I scrapped that. Some random bits:
|
| - There's rather limited contact between the linguistic
| communities of Belgium.
|
| - Knowledge of nl is generally extremely limited in
| Wallonia. I have a feeling it's improving a bit, even if nl
| is not obligatory in education there.
|
| - Knowledge of fr is clearly worsening with the youngest
| generation in Flanders, even if fr is obligatory in
| education there.
|
| - Mixed nl/fr work environments used to be fr.
|
| - Friends from outside Belgium often tell me they notice
| absurd humor as a common trait.
|
| - Lots of interesting things to say about language
| community history too. Long story short, the language
| border hardly moved the last few hundred years, except for
| Brussels turning majority nl-> fr in the last ~100 years
| [0].
|
| - Did you know Belgium has large ar, ber, de (official
| language!), it, ku, ln and tr communities too?
|
| [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francization_of_Brussels
|
| P.S. If you like Poelvoorde, watch
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Brand_New_Testament .
| ghaff wrote:
| In a prior life (i.e. 25 years or so ago), I was in
| Brussels for a work event where there were various
| speeches. The way it worked is that you either spoke
| English or you spoke alternating French/Flemish.
| glandium wrote:
| 20 years or so ago, I went to the movies in Brussels. A
| movie in English with subtitles. Both in French and
| Flemish at the same time, and in many cases the subtitles
| were taking close to half the height, it was ridiculous.
| azalemeth wrote:
| I have a very good friend from Flanders. His partner is
| from wallonia. He told me that the word 'poopen' is nl
| slang in one community for 'to have sex with' and 'to
| defecate' in the other. This caused much hilarity.
| markvdb wrote:
| "Poepen" is nl_nl for "to defecate", and nl_be for "to
| have sexual intercourse".
| smnrchrds wrote:
| Thank you for this information. What are ber, ln, and ku?
| anticensor wrote:
| ber: Berber
|
| ln: Bantu Lingala
|
| ku: Kurdish
| vanderZwan wrote:
| > _Friends from outside Belgium often tell me they notice
| absurd humor as a common trait._
|
| Explains why you had some of the best surrealists back in
| the day
| sjrd wrote:
| Those combinations are indeed quite common in Belgium.
| Another example: myself :-p (Sebastien Doeraene).
| smnrchrds wrote:
| If I may ask, what is the story behind your name? For
| example, is one of your parents francophone and the other
| one Dutch? Do you speak both languages natively?
| cinntaile wrote:
| Very few people in Belgium speak both French and Flemish
| natively. It's one or the other, depending on which side
| of the language border you live on. In Flanders you have
| compulsory French classes while in Wallonia you don't
| have compulsory Flemish classes, but the compulsory
| classes don't get you anywhere near native proficiency.
| His last name doesn't sound very Flemish so his ancestors
| probably moved to Wallonia at least a few generations
| back. To me it even sounds like a Flemish version of a
| French name. The parent should correct me if I'm mistaken
| of course, deducting where someone is from based on their
| last or first name can be quite tricky in my experience.
| NicoJuicy wrote:
| I don't agree. My French is good enough for talking to
| French canadians ( native dutch).
|
| And even french have trouble understanding the Quebec
| language.
|
| Some that learned it never use it, so they forget it
| though. But they don't need it professionally.
| cinntaile wrote:
| Good enough is not even close to native though. He was
| wondering about native.
| NicoJuicy wrote:
| Well, he was saying:
|
| > but the compulsory classes don't get you anywhere near
| native proficiency.
|
| And my proficiency is good enough work related and when I
| meet people. With no issues.
|
| What more would i need?
| cinntaile wrote:
| That's what I wrote. The original comment received a
| question "Do you speak both languages natively?". While
| not aimed at me, I addressed it for the general case.
| People aren't brought up with both languages and will not
| have a native understanding of both. 6 years of at most 3
| to 5 hours a week of French in high school don't get you
| to native level. I don't doubt at all that it's
| sufficient for your needs, but the bar for native is much
| higher than communicating without issues when dealing
| with work or meeting people. Even if you were at native
| level, it still wouldn't mean that this is the general
| case.
|
| I hope the original poster replies as well, it would be
| interesting to know if he knows the history behind his
| last name.
| cinntaile wrote:
| It depends on what you mean. There is no significant
| linguistic overlap. There are some exceptions such as if
| you live near the language border. But last names ending up
| in the other side of the country is not that uncommon,
| people move around and some end up getting kids there.
| NicoJuicy wrote:
| A lot of people in the north of france spoke Dutch/were
| Belgian.
|
| Some old people in french speaking still speak dialect
| dutch. Not the "new" generation.
|
| French Flanders:
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Flanders
|
| Additionally, Wallonie is also french speaking and not
| dutch.
|
| So my guess is that it's pretty common ;)
| ddnb wrote:
| Yes there is, another example: Jean-Claude Van Cauwenberghe
| is a Walloon politician, Geert Bourgeois is a Flemish one.
| gillesjacobs wrote:
| There's a significant overlap in naming and there's a lot
| of professional language contact. But culturally and
| politically, the linguistic communities are divided.
| vimy wrote:
| When Flanders was poor a lot of Flemings moved to Wallonia,
| at the time it was the wealthy part of Belgium, to find
| work. They stayed and their kids grew up learning French
| and then their kids did as well, only their last names
| reminding them of where their ancestors came from.
| hinkley wrote:
| Sometimes it's collectively referred to as Benelux, so a
| name that would fit in the Netherlands does not surprise
| me.
|
| It does throw me when some documentary interviews a
| Frenchman with a very German last name. Until I find out he
| lives in Alsace. That area traded hands so many times.
| There are some French names on the other side of the border
| too, I'm told.
|
| And isn't "Austria" just a mistranslation of the German for
| "The outer lands"? But we don't talk about that any more.
| Not since The War.
| karatinversion wrote:
| "Eastern realm", actually. Wikipedia has some details -
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Austria#Etymology
| csunbird wrote:
| Osterreich - The Eastern Empire (my limited german)
|
| Ost - East
|
| Oster - To the east, easter - relative to something
|
| Reich - Empire
| a4isms wrote:
| Completely OT, but I once gave a keynote at a conference
| in Malmo. There was a speaker's dinner at the city hall,
| hosted by the Mayor.
|
| The walls were decorated with portraits. He explained
| these were the various Kinds that ruled over Malmo. he
| recited their nationalities with ease as he went through
| the list, it swung from nation to nation.
|
| When he finished, he explained that this explained a lot
| of Malmo's culture: The land had been occupied by so many
| different nations so many different times, he claimed
| that older residents would keep a set of flags tucked
| away to welcome the next set of occupiers.
|
| I'm sure it was practised patter, but it did provide a
| certain historical context.
| jaeh wrote:
| During the second world war, Austria was called
| "Ostmark", not osterreich.
|
| And yes, "we do not talk about that" since the war ended,
| the Myth that we were the "First Victim of the Nazis"
| still perpetuates, at least in the Generation of my
| Grandmother (who is 94).
|
| The only austrian resistance when the nazis entered in
| 1938 was a Group of International Brigades that had
| returned from the spanish Civil War and they all got
| slaughtered. You likely will not find that in a lot of
| history books either, somehow the ~80.000 international
| Volunteers of the Civil War in Spain are rarely mentioned
| anywhere.
|
| No Pasaran!
| jfengel wrote:
| I think you're mixing it up with Ukraine, which can be
| translated as "border land".
|
| https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%D0%A3%D0%BA%D1%80%D0%B0%D
| 1%9... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Name_of_Ukraine
| Mvandenbergh wrote:
| Yes, specifically it's more common that way around than the
| other due to the large influx of Flemish workers who moved
| to the coal and iron regions in Wallonia during the
| industrial revolution.
|
| Most people with FR first name and Dutch last name are
| Walloons who probably do not speak Flemish.
| aasasd wrote:
| Searching the web immediately turns up:
|
| > _Man Bites Dog is an intensely disturbing movie that,
| despite having frequent moments of dark humor, is shockingly
| violent and very difficult to watch._
|
| With 74% on RT, which is pretty good. I already have
| conflicting emotions from this. The descriptions evoke the
| spirit of Bret Easton Ellis' stuff.
|
| What I've seen of French film violence tends to be cinematic
| in an off-putting way, but perhaps that's only post-2000s
| explosion of movie tricks.
| ad404b8a372f2b9 wrote:
| The quote is overstating it IMO. Maybe for its time it was
| shocking but if you compare it to game of thrones for
| example, which has rape scenes, torture and murder it's
| nothing to write home about in its depiction of those.
|
| I watched it as a teen with my family and it didn't shock
| me in the least. It's serious but not traumatizing.
| dudul wrote:
| I actually think it is easier to watch as a teen 5han an
| adult. I watched it a lot with my buddies when I was
| younger, it was one of our cult movies.
|
| Today, as an adult and a dad I dont know if I could watch
| the kid murder scene.
| shirleyquirk wrote:
| Man bites dog is amazing, a noir mockumentary american
| psycho.
| aasasd wrote:
| Ellis' 'Glamorama' actually has a film crew following the
| protagonist. However that book is difficult to comprehend
| (sorta in the 70s/80s transgression-surrealism way), so
| I'm still not sure what the crew actually does, if
| anything.
| csours wrote:
| Maybe I was the only one confused but "C'est arrive pres de
| chez vous" means 'It Happened Near Your Home'. The movie was
| released in English as "Man Bites Dog"
| gryn wrote:
| it's very common to give unrelated titles to films when
| translating them, for some reason.
|
| some times the 'local' title for films that are in English
| get another unrelated English title.
| gerdesj wrote:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man_bites_dog is a
| fictitious newspaper headline. However I'm pretty sure
| I've seen it used, tongue in cheek.
| speedgoose wrote:
| Wikipedia says that they removed the woman rape and the kid
| murder scenes on the American version, 30 years ago. I don't
| know if people would appreciate such a movie today.
| ad404b8a372f2b9 wrote:
| Game Of Thrones has rape, child murder, and torture. I
| think it'd do fine in that respect.
| speedgoose wrote:
| True. It doesn't feel the same though. Maybe because it's
| a fake documentary where the filming crew participates in
| the rape / murders.
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gx8MHwRLkMc
| cinntaile wrote:
| Not everyone prefers to watch mainstream movies. This movie
| was never mainstream and themes like this haven't faded out
| or anything.
| capableweb wrote:
| > I don't know if people would appreciate such a movie
| today
|
| I'm fairly certain most people outside of the north-
| american-cancel bubble know how to separate fantasy from
| reality, so while maybe hard to watch, there won't be any
| uproar.
|
| Edit: judging by the downvotes, HN is not outside that
| bubble, my mistake
| yosito wrote:
| Serious question: why does anyone but the farmer care? A 2m move
| in the middle of a field hardly seems to make much of a
| difference to anyone else.
| Anechoic wrote:
| It's likely that surveys reference positions from that stone.
| No one may care now, but a few years down the line if someone
| is trying to survey the path for a rail project, power line,
| etc, that could lead to problems.
| bigmattystyles wrote:
| Because you have to draw the line somewhere!
| macintux wrote:
| I'm conflicted: HN frowns on humor, but this really is a
| brilliant reply.
| blacksqr wrote:
| Now do Mt. Fuji.
| yalogin wrote:
| It looks like the farmer's land spreads across the border. How is
| that possible? Or at the very least his land goes all the way to
| the border line. Either way, in today's age when the line can
| digitally recorded, why do we need the stone? Both countries know
| where the line goes through. Could they not just ignore that one
| stone and let the farmer do his work? I was hoping they would
| just ignore it, instead I see that he has to put it back, else
| face criminal charges too.
| foepys wrote:
| > How is that possible?
|
| May I introduce you to the town of Baarle-Hertog? A town that
| is not only split between the Netherlands and Belgium but
| inside the Netherlands with Belgium owning most of the town
| with Dutch fragments inside it. Some houses have a Dutch as
| well as a Belgian address.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baarle-Hertog
| kazen44 wrote:
| Also, if i remember correctly, they share common services
| too. (things like garbage, police, fire brigade etc).
| wincy wrote:
| Wow, as a US citizen looking at the France/Belgium border [0] I
| can't imagine what it'd be like for a disagreement with your next
| door neighbor to become an international incident. I suppose it's
| probably just no big deal.
|
| [0] https://goo.gl/maps/cPbAY3DxQNhUy2SZ9
| cr1895 wrote:
| Oh, that's nothing! Look up Baarle-Hertog and Baarle-Nassau on
| the Belgian-Dutch border.
|
| During the beginning of the pandemic, it brought about some
| truly bizarre situations:
| https://www.thebulletin.be/coronavirus-store-dutch-border-ha...
| capableweb wrote:
| Most of the people in Europe are war-weary since wars have been
| had in their front-yard, as compared to some other countries
| who only fight on foreign soil but still seem aggressive. So I
| would think it's easier to keep peace with your neighbors.
| kazen44 wrote:
| Also, digging up world war 1 and 2 bombs and artillery shell
| from our literal front and backyards serves as a reminder
| aswell.
| csunbird wrote:
| > A local history enthusiast was walking in the forest when he
| noticed the stone marking the boundary between the two countries
| had moved 2.29m (7.5ft).
|
| How do you even measure that effectively? Aren't the stones more
| than hundreds of meters away from each other?
|
| edit: for example, can I do that as well with minimal equipment
| (e.g. with just a phone)?
| gillesjacobs wrote:
| From experience with living near The Three-Border Region
| (Drielandenpunt) on the Belgian-German-Dutch border these
| marking stones are fairly frequent, every hundred meters in the
| woods.
|
| I always figured they were mostly symbolic. At least I hope,
| because the local loggers have moved Germany about 30 meters
| into Luxemburg by uprooting a stone.
| teachingassist wrote:
| I'd guess this has got this level of accuracy via back-and-
| forth mis-translation. "A good 2 metres" (as Flemish news is
| quoting) became "7.5ft" became "2.29m"
|
| Or, if you can identify where a stone has been moved from and
| to, you can use the pre-installed iOS app 'Measure', which
| always gives you a number to the nearest cm over this distance.
| throwaway0a5e wrote:
| GPS.
|
| The border was likely digitized a decade or two ago. Someone
| noticed the stone didn't match the database.
| BitwiseFool wrote:
| I also feel like the "real" border is a line in a GIS
| database. Sure, the stone is _supposed_ to be the border
| based on a 19th century treaty but we all know a 21st century
| government is not going to actually treat the stone 's
| placement as the official border.
| bellyfullofbac wrote:
| If the stone is the legal marker, take it on a plane to
| China, mess up all the nice polygons...
| stereo wrote:
| The real border is in the treaty. They describe
| geographical features that have sometimes moved ("the river
| x"), don't exist anymore ("the big oak tree") or take a lot
| of time to rediscover ("the field belonging to the widow
| soandso").
|
| The stone is often only near the border - if the border is
| a path in a forest, you're not going to plonk it down in
| the middle of the path.
|
| The gis database for administrative boundaries in
| Luxembourg[0] gets updated once a week, because the borders
| are based on cadastral measurements, which have been
| constantly updated since the 19th century. There's an error
| in every measurement, the idea is that over time it will
| average itself out.
|
| [0] https://data.public.lu/fr/datasets/limites-
| administratives-d...
| kazen44 wrote:
| some borders are also based on really, really old
| treaties in europe. A lot of borders in regards to
| provinces are based on old counties and baronies for
| example. Baarle-hertog/baarle-nassau being a famous
| example of the inconvenice it results in.
|
| Prior to world war 2, this was also the case inside
| germany, considering many Lander still had lands all over
| the place (especially prussia) which made governance a
| hassle.
| foobarian wrote:
| "One does not simply use GPS to mark a spot..."
|
| I tried this at home and it turns out that easily available
| GPS devices have huge amounts of error, especially without
| unobstructed line of sight like in woods. I left a phone on a
| stump recording a walking trail, and it wandered around
| multiple tens of meters. There is value in what the surveyors
| do :) Although I guess they would use markers like this as
| references, so unless they crosscheck with multiple markers
| and fancy GPS they could make mistakes too.
|
| Edit: and the whole while the GPS receiver is reporting a
| misleading "5ft" or similar accuracy.
| capableweb wrote:
| I'm unsure where in the world you are, but accuracy depends
| on the satellite you're receiving data from. Commercial GPS
| satellites (or rather the stream you receive) also have
| better precision than normal "consumer" ones, and one could
| assume military has the most accurate ones. The new Galileo
| (Europe) system has a accuracy down to 1 meter, while
| GLONASS (Russia) has something like 3 meters. The
| commercial accuracy of Galileo is down to 1 cm though.
| Twixes wrote:
| Is Galileo online?
| capableweb wrote:
| Yes. Here is the status page for Galileo:
| https://www.gsc-europa.eu/system-service-
| status/constellatio...
| vbezhenar wrote:
| How commercial and normal are differentiated? Is it
| possible to crack it and use in your own GPS device?
| capableweb wrote:
| Seems Galileo has four different services that it offers.
| Open Service is the public service. If you understand the
| protocol and radio signals, you can build your own device
| to read it yourself.
|
| High Accuracy Service used to be the commercial service,
| but is now just called HAS and is offered free of charge
| apparently.
|
| Then there is Public Regulated Service for government
| bodies, and a Search and Rescue Service.
| capableweb wrote:
| Where I was brought up, I was taught how to estimate/measure
| meters in steps when in school, so everyone had a specific gait
| that measures a meter. 100 of those steps ~= 100 meters. No
| phone needed :)
| csunbird wrote:
| I do not think that steps have that good of a precision
| (2.29%) over 100 steps for measuring distance. Can a human
| achieve that?
| capableweb wrote:
| I was thinking more that he somehow discovered there might
| be an issue when measuring without good precision, and
| later came back to verify with a proper method.
| saalweachter wrote:
| Honestly, given the roundness of 7.5 ft, I would assume
| that 7.5 ft was the estimate and it was improperly
| converted to 2.29m as a precise measure.
|
| With the unusualness of a European measuring something in
| feet.
|
| It always irks me when I see signs saying "keep 6 ft
| (1.8288 m) apart", because 6 feet is just a round number
| of the approximate distance, and it's fine to just say
| "keep 6 ft (2 m) apart", for all that you'll get weirdos
| going "Well which is it??? 6 feet or 2 meters????"
| koheripbal wrote:
| A "local historian" - he likely knows the specific marker and
| has been walking past it for years.
| mlavin wrote:
| I'm guessing the hole it originally sat in is still visible?
| dev_tty01 wrote:
| Not if the soil is being farmed. Plowing, cultivation, etc.
| will fill in any small hole.
| detaro wrote:
| Phone GPS struggles with that kind of precision, but for
| professional GPS gear (which is becoming a lot more affordable
| recently) few cm precision is not that much of a challenge. And
| I would assume that the enthusiast just noticed it being _off_
| from what it had been before and the precise number being one
| determined by a professional, or someone with professional
| tools.
| matt_s wrote:
| Sounds like it was on purpose, not an accident, since the stone
| marker of the border was always in his tractor's path.
| stinos wrote:
| Almost definitely on purpose. Not sure if this is limited to
| Belgium, but these days it's like the national sport for almost
| all farmers in my neighbourhood to just take a bit of land
| extra every year. A nearby road (well, path) used to be about
| 4m wide 10 years ago. Now only 1.5m is left untouched, the rest
| is now farmland. It is likely a sign of much bigger problems
| (food pricing, for one), but also an extra pressure on the few
| nature which is left in between the fields, not ideal when it
| comes to erosion, and so on.
| StavrosK wrote:
| Must be nice to have neighbours that aren't threatening to go to
| war if your borders change.
| frockington1 wrote:
| Are there many border wars in the developed world? I can think
| of Israel/Palestine and India/Pakistan but admittedly am not
| familiar on the subject
| robert_foss wrote:
| Russia/Ukraine is a big one. China/neighbors in the South
| China Sea.
| StavrosK wrote:
| Turkey is threatening war if Greece extends its borders to
| the 12 nm allowed by the UNCLOS. A farmer moving a stone that
| changed the border here would be a serious incident.
| rsynnott wrote:
| For sea borders, sometimes:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cod_Wars#Third_Cod_War
| kazen44 wrote:
| mind you, this was not the case in Europe for a better part of
| it's history.[0]
|
| [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_conflicts_in_Europe
| [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pax_Europaea
| ilamont wrote:
| If you want to see a messed-up peaceful border situation, there
| is a Mohawk community straddling the U.S./Canadian border with
| the actual line going through NY State, Ontario, Quebec, Cornwall
| Island, and the St. Lawrence River. The convoluted rules
| inhabitants have to follow to see relatives, go to school, get
| medical care and conduct daily business are extreme.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akwesasne
| koheripbal wrote:
| They actually have fewer regulations and can usually cross the
| boarder very easily.
|
| It's one of the reasons that the area is extremely popular for
| smuggling.
| Turing_Machine wrote:
| Right. I believe that is the place where the American side
| was (on paper) consuming hundreds or thousands of times the
| normal rate of Canadian cigarettes.
|
| What was happening was that the cigarettes were being sold as
| export items (so little/no Canadian tax paid), exported to
| the American side, then smuggled back into Canada via the
| Canadian side.
| ilamont wrote:
| _Vince Thompson is one of about 2,000 Mohawks who lives
| there. He 's also represents the Island as a chief on the
| Mohawk Council of Akwesasne. Just to take his daughter to a
| dentist appointment and go to some meetings, he says, he has
| to go back and forth through U.S. and Canadian customs,
| waiting in line and answering intrusive questions each time.
| "I'm going home. I gotta report in. Then I gotta race back
| home, pick up my daughter, then report back in, then proceed
| to the dental or medical appointments," Thompson shakes his
| head. "It's unbelievable."_
|
| https://www.northcountrypublicradio.org/news/story/36230/201.
| ..
| koheripbal wrote:
| While I'm sure that's true - it is still a very popular
| smuggling area exactly because the border patrol is very
| thin.
| frenchy wrote:
| Would it be better just to solve that by putting up stops
| on both sides of the reserve's border?
| markstos wrote:
| My family farm got a new neighbor, who noticed that he
| technically owns a sliver of land with the first 100 feet of our
| gravel driveway, nevermind that we've been using it for the past
| 50 years since our property was purchased. I don't think anyone
| had noticed before, as this goes way back before GIS systems and
| satellite photos of property boundaries. For decades there's been
| a fence in the logical place between the driveway and the
| neighboring property.
|
| The legal system would probably side with us, but it's a pain.
| thaeli wrote:
| The easiest thing for everyone involved is for their neighbor
| to grant an easement for the existing driveway. That way they
| can keep using it, but it's with explicit permission, so the
| neighbor doesn't have to worry about an adverse possession
| claim. If they're not amenable to that, the specifics digfer by
| state, but usually it's a "boundary line agreement" or similar
| where you'd basically be buying that small sliver of land and
| amending the property line accordingly. Here's hoping their
| neighbors are reasonable!
| markstos wrote:
| Thanks for the input! So far the neighbor hasn't been
| reasonable at all, so I don't expect we'll get to do this the
| easy way.
| 1123581321 wrote:
| If they're being unreasonable, you probably can just insist
| on keeping it. Take a look on the expirations by state
| here: https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/state-state-
| rules-ad... Good luck!
| goodcanadian wrote:
| To be fair (assuming it's a common law country), the GP
| probably already owns it through adverse possession if they
| have been using it openly for 50 years or more.
| ifdefdebug wrote:
| Maybe related: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27038094
| ssully wrote:
| Have they been giving your family trouble about it? I can't
| imagine causing issues with your neighbor is worth such a small
| piece of land.
| danlugo92 wrote:
| I wish that one day all borders in the world were like this.
| lenkite wrote:
| Yes, let a hundred such farmers do this and claim several
| square kilometres of territory. After all this farmer did and
| got away scot-free. Thus more people can do it.
|
| Frankly, if he doesn't get rapped on the knuckles it's a
| _guarantee_ that other folks will try the same thing.
|
| Borders should be changed via treaty and diplomacy not by some
| un-educated moron deciding to take matters into his own hands.
| That only encourages border conflicts.
| josephcsible wrote:
| You make it sound like his change to the border is going to
| stick. They told him to put the stone back where it was. If
| he refuses, he probably won't get away scot-free.
| nerbert wrote:
| Yeah it really shows how peace and nations working together can
| make stuff like that a non-issue. Everyone is so relaxed about
| it.
| throwaway0a5e wrote:
| Or more cynically, things only go smoothly when there's
| nothing at stake.
| majewsky wrote:
| It's the other way around. The thing that's at stake is
| economic cooperation, so both sides are more willing to
| find an amicable solution than otherwise.
| enimodas wrote:
| That's what they said before ww1
| oblio wrote:
| World peace will happen when everyone in the world [1]
| will be convinced that every other human out there is
| worth more to them alive, unharmed and happy.
|
| [1] Or at least an overwhelming majority of people.
| brnt wrote:
| Not to mention peace! War is expensive, deadly, and
| altogether unpleasant. It's good to know this gets higher
| priority than minor territorial changes.
| SllX wrote:
| France and Belgium are within the Schengen Area and the
| sign out front says 81 years since the last Blitzkrieg.
|
| This is really small potatoes.
| BitwiseFool wrote:
| I think that's only the case because this a really
| insignificant amount of land, nothing is "at-stake", both
| countries belong to the EU, and most importantly the "real"
| border is a line on a map that both countries agree on.
| Archelaos wrote:
| The border between Germany and France, between Rhineland-
| Palatinate, and the Moselle and Bas-Rhin departments is adjusted
| from time to time by a few meters, whenever the course of small
| border rivers has changed.
| gumby wrote:
| A few meters from my mother in law's house stood a small stone
| marker next to the forest path (hers was the last one in the
| village, and was enclosed by the forest itself). One side of the
| stone read "Brauschweig", the other "Hannover". It was easy to
| miss, being buried in the undergrowth.
|
| A few years ago someone got the idea that it was of Important
| Historical Interest and so _moved it_ further down the path. It
| 's not clear whether this moved the "actual"* border since they
| didn't place it in the same orientation. Somehow the
| misorientation annoys me more than moving it.
|
| * "actual" gets quotation marks as the denoted territories no
| longer exist, though the cities by those names do.
| purple_ferret wrote:
| The interesting implication here is the stone seems to mark the
| 'official' border and the nobody but the farmer can move it back
| without engaging in some sort of bureaucratic process.
|
| If it is in, presumably, French territory now, why can't some
| French resident roll it back?
| vidarh wrote:
| I'd be more inclined to assume it's just that nobody wants the
| hassle, and so it's easier to just insist it's up to the
| farmer.
| mytailorisrich wrote:
| Yeah, I read this as " _just put it back where it was and we
| 'll all forget it ever happened_".
| Arnavion wrote:
| Also, they probably want to make sure the farmer knows that
| it's not supposed to be moved, so that he doesn't just move
| it again.
| leokennis wrote:
| This made me wonder...are (most) of the (undisputed) borders of
| the world actually stored somewhere? Or are some stones and posts
| still the "official" borders?
| libertine wrote:
| Here in Portugal we (and Spain) have landmarks that define the
| border, and there's a treaty signed in 1846 that states these
| landmarks should be maintained in cooperation between the two
| countries.
|
| You can see some examples here, with the numbers and type of
| landmarks (apparently there are 1010 stone marks, other types
| of marks are wet marks for example, like rivers and lakes):
| https://pt.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lista_de_tro%C3%A7os_da_raia_(...
| pedrocr wrote:
| Although we don't officially agree what those actual borders
| are everywhere:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olivenza#Claims_of_sovereignty
| jdasdf wrote:
| We both agree on the border there, see the treaty of
| vienna. The problem is that spain doesn't do what they
| agreed to do.
| libertine wrote:
| I wonder when this we be brought to light, specially when
| we have a pressing matter with Spain that's also being
| avoided, yet it could be extremely damaging to
| Portugal... I'm talking about the management of Tejo
| river.
|
| The re routing Spain is doing is contributing to the
| destruction of a massive portion of Portugal ecosystems.
| MauranKilom wrote:
| Here is a fun example:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alaska_boundary_dispute
| gmueckl wrote:
| If this was in Germany, there would be a fairly high precision
| map somewhere that records the intended position of each marker
| stone. This is usually the case for demarcations between
| private properties. If one of them gets moved, surveyors get
| sent out to measure the proper location from the map data and
| surrounding markers. And there's usually a fine for whoever
| moved such a stone.
| Bayart wrote:
| They're stored in law. Treaties define borders in (seemingly)
| unambiguous terms. Meridians, river beds and so. Problems arise
| when river beds move and everything becomes extremely
| ambiguous. In the worst case scenario you've got borders
| defined by older borders of poorly documented feudal holdings
| and it's up in the wind where the actual border ought to be. So
| states have to negotiate to redefine them in modern terms.
| tinus_hn wrote:
| The ground itself can move over 5 cm a year due to tectonics.
| selimnairb wrote:
| And river meanders are doing just that, meandering to and
| fro, changing (albeit slowly) continuously. Modern borders
| need to be tied geodetic datums, which has been also
| mentioned are also constantly changing (although probably
| more slowly than most rivers) and need to be updated
| continuously. The new datums coming out of the GRAV-D
| project will address the need for continuous updating
| (https://www.ngs.noaa.gov/datums/newdatums/index.shtml).
| leokennis wrote:
| Ok...but I'd assume those are pretty hefty law books then?
|
| "Follow river such and so, then on that one field of farmer
| Jones turn left until the tree, turn right and walk in a
| straight line to that pointy rock, then walk back to the
| river etc. etc."?
| thaeli wrote:
| Yes, this is pretty much what actual "metes and bounds"
| deeds from several centuries ago look like.
| g_p wrote:
| In the UK (technically Great Britain in this context) at least,
| there is an open dataset available from the national mapping
| authority (Ordnance Survey), which is called boundary lines. It
| contains all of the different boundary lines and borders of
| local authorities, parliamentary constituencies, regions,
| nations etc.
|
| This is all geo referenced against the OSGB coordinate system.
|
| I could see interesting challenges in doing this for
| international borders where both countries use different
| coordinate systems and projections for their mapping, and the
| potential for slithers of no-mans-land. I guess at a certain
| point, you need to refer back to what's on the ground, as over
| decades the land erodes from the sea, and rock formations
| collapse and shift as the earth moves etc. The definition of
| location gets far easier when you have satellites offering
| precision navigation and timing!
| iso1631 wrote:
| In the UK, most freehold boundaries are available as a gml
| file. I'm looking at moving house and have one open right now
| in fact, here's a screenshot of it
|
| https://imgur.com/cX2Seow.png
|
| The white area being roads and non-registered land (mainly
| stuff that hasn't sold for decades and roads).
|
| It's great, I can find a unique owner for any bit of field I
| have a question about, the size of the plot, etc.
|
| The downside is that to get a copy of the actual entry in the
| register (to see who owns it and any covenants on the
| property there are), you have to pay PS3. The entire process
| is digital and automated, IMO it should be free, but I
| suppose it's not a terrible price.
| simpss wrote:
| it has a small price so it becomes difficult/cost-
| prohibitive to use for nastier purposes.
|
| ex, in my country forest owners get spammed and targeted by
| forest-management companies that want to cut it down.
| NelsonMinar wrote:
| Are those boundary lines the actual legal international
| definition of the borders? Or is it just some convenient
| representation close enough for ordinary uses?
|
| You'd think location via GPS or similar framework was easy
| but it's not nearly as easy as you'd think. Among other
| things, the land is moving. Both continental plates and then
| also local features like river beds. See e.g.
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_TX--Fku9NQ
| mnw21cam wrote:
| The OS maps the borders of local authorities. However, it
| doesn't hold the authoritative map of the borders of the
| counties. I don't mean the modern local authorities that call
| themselves counties - I mean the traditional counties, which
| haven't been abolished or changed for centuries. The exact
| location of these is defined almost tautologically - a place
| is part of a certain county because it has always been. The
| exact location of the border is more a matter of folklore
| than anything else.
|
| Likewise, the exact location of borders between properties is
| usually ill-defined. Only borders that have gone through a
| painstaking process of surveying and registering (usually
| after a dispute or on a new build) are exactly defined.
| Usually, when you move into a new house, you have a fence
| around your property, and the boundary is generally assumed
| to be inside the fence (with conventions for whose land the
| fence sits on that aren't always followed).
|
| Adverse possession makes it more complicated. A neighbour
| decided to put up a new fence, and weren't nice about it. I
| stipulated (in line with the law) that no part of the new
| fence could be placed on my property (except parts under the
| ground surface). They decided to put the fence in the "wrong"
| way round, with the vertical posts on their property, and the
| fence attached on their side of the posts, effectively giving
| me sole access to the area of land in-between their fence
| posts. If I were to sell my house, the new owner would be
| quite reasonable in assuming that that land was theirs. After
| the requisite time, I could apply to have the land legally
| registered as mine, although the new laws mean that the
| neighbour would be informed and given a chance to "evict" me
| from the land - they would have to tear down their fence and
| rebuild it the right way round so that I don't have sole
| access to it any more. In this way, adverse possession
| effectively resets the boundary to where the actual fence is
| in practice every now and again, which means that the land
| registry doesn't need to store exact boundary locations.
| pacaro wrote:
| My parents' house is a good example of this. The rear
| boundary of the property is defined as being some distance
| from the road. It's not totally clear (although I assume
| that there is a standard) whether this means the curtilage
| or something else. When the land behind the property was
| redeveloped (from a run down witches cottage to a block of
| flats) it was important to my parents that the treeline at
| the rear of the property not be cut down. The deciding
| factor was the rusted remains of an old fence on the far
| side of the trees. I had been under instructions as a kid
| to not mess with that or pull it up because my parents knew
| that it was important to preserve this kind of evidence
| BerislavLopac wrote:
| I'm not really sure how would one really mark _this_ with
| stones... https://goo.gl/maps/Nn8ygXHJKkfHGFTs9
| Wafje wrote:
| Or this one, also Belgium:
| https://www.google.com/maps/@51.4408275,4.9469359,14.35z
| wglb wrote:
| Texas says hold my beer
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27038157
| henvic wrote:
| Damn. Just leave the farmer alone.
| kingkongjaffa wrote:
| Surely grounds for a full scale invasion!
| avereveard wrote:
| They will bypass their land defences going trough Germany
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