A Tale of Two Waterfronts: Preserving Coastal Areas for Public Use

By Donna Ramer | October 2, 2015

Waterway use for farming oysters has been an ongoing battle across the U.S. for more than a century. In New Jersey, the battle was fought in 1820 – and settled in 1821 — when a local citizen was charged with trespassing while collecting oysters along the New Jersey Shore. The New Jersey Supreme Court issued a landmark decision that became the legal basis for subsequent cases: the man had the right to be there because, under the Public Trust Doctrine, most waterways are held by the public for public use. And this decision continues to be reaffirmed in current court battles.

FBW executive director Ron Hine and Summer Brennan, author of The Oyster War – The True Story of a Small Farm, Big Politics, and the Future of the Wilderness in America, addressed oyster wars and other waterfront battles at an October 1st book signing at Hoboken’s Little City Books.

Brennan’s books details the 30-year conflict between California’s Drakes Bay Oyster Company and the Point Reyes National Seashore in Northern California that pitted environmentalists against a property owner. In 1976 the Point Reyes Wilderness Act threatened to shut down a small, family-run oyster farm established in the 1930s. The owner vowed to take his fight to the Supreme Court. This battle had the power to influence wilderness law for decades to come.

Hine detailed how the Fund for a Better Waterfront uses referenda, litigation and public advocacy to take advantage of a once-in-a-century opportunity to transform Hoboken’s waterfront from a gritty, working waterfront to a public park that is available to everyone.