California Bill Would Dramatically Limit Commercial Drones

An anonymous reader writes: California's Senate Bill 142 would prohibit drones from flying under 350 feet over any property without express permission from the property's owner. The bill passed the California Assembly easily. Tech advocates have been battling privacy advocates to influence the inevitable regulation of private and commercial drones. Industry groups say this restriction will kill drone delivery services before they even begin. The legislation would also drastically diminish the usefulness of camera-centric drones like the ones being rolled out by GoPro. If passed, the bill could influence how other states regulate drones. The article notes that 156 different drone-related bills have been considered in 46 different states this year alone, and the FAA will issue nationwide rules in September.

Comments

Good.

[Anonymous Coward]

Drones have no legitimate reason to fly over private property. Too bad for you city dwellers, guess there's a reason to leave for the countryside after all, huh?

The next step is to ban aerial photography by drones entirely.

Re:Good.

[davester666]

He believes blackmail will be the most important new industry of the 21st century. AshMad is another way to get the info.

The NSA will lead the way.

Re:Good.

[blogagog]

I don't think flying peeping Tom's counts as an 'industry'. Still, they say porn made the internet what it is today, so, who knows.

Re:Good.

[AaronW]

It depends on where you are within the state. In the major population centers it's fairly blue. In the rest of the state it's fairly red.

With the recent voter initiatives that largely did away with gerrymandering and made it so that the two biggest vote getters run in the main election the state government has become far more centrist. In a recent election in my district for the US house of representatives it was between a very left-wing democrat against a centrist moderate democrat. The centrist beat out the long-term left-wing democrat. In other districts there were two republicans running against each other and often the more moderate candidate won. The system tends to favor moderates in both parties over the extreme left or right. The endless bickering and road blocks have largely gone away and the state finally has a budget surplus and rainy day fund due in large part to a spendthrift democrat governor. The republican obstructionism has largely gone away and the two sides are actually working together *gasp*. That's not to say things are perfect, but it's far better than it was when everything was held hostage by the far right. In some way our governor is too much of a spendthrift. Our roads are among the worst in the nation and we need to spend some serious dough to repair them but he's being quite reluctant to raise the gasoline tax or pay for it despite even the very conservative Chamber of Commerce asking for this.

Cry me a river

[I'm New Around Here]

" Industry groups say this restriction will kill drone delivery services before they even begin. "

Sounds like a good use of state authority to me.

Re:Cry me a river

[harlows_monkeys]

that's very Libertarian of you, endorsing even more government regulations. "Cognitive dissonance" in operation?

Uhm...using state authority to enforce private property rights is one of the few things most schools of libertarianism agree is a legitimate use of state power.

Re:Cry me a river

[Jeremi]

that's very Libertarian of you, endorsing even more government regulations. "Cognitive dissonance" in operation?

Isn't a strong defense of private property rights a Libertarian principle? In this case, the proposed law would be enforcing property owners' right not to have uninvited guests buzzing around in their private airspace.

Re:Cry me a river

[Anonymous Coward]

How about this; keep your fucking toys away from my property, you twisted pervert.

And keep them away from mine also. We're not all libertarians here, you know.

Actually, I cannot conceive of any situation in which I'd want drones to fly over my property, whether loitering or whizzing. I explicitly include package delivery services, as there is no way I'd want drones from amazon or others flying at moderate altitudes over my property. If law enforcement drones whizzed overhead, it would depend on the laws passed. We often sunbathe nude, and have every expectation of privacy while doing so, as the places we sunbathe are not visible from any public land or from any of our neighbor's land [*]. If law enforcement drones loitered without a warrant, they'd get shot down (we have enough acres to do this).

[*] One or two military boys fly overhead occasionally in their chase games - typically once per month, but unpredictably. I suspect they're at rather more than 350 feet, and going much faster than a drone.

Re:Cry me a river

[l0n3s0m3phr34k]

Real Libertarians don't need the State to help them out.

Re:Cry me a river

[drinkypoo]

You don't actually know any libertarians, now do you.

I do. I know more than I want to. Libertarians always favor laws and courts, they just favor ones that only handle the issues they want them to handle, and they imagine that they will always side with them. Libertarians think that they are smarter than everyone else, and want police protection from their slaves, who it is right to oppress because they are less fortunate.

Did I leave anything out of the libertarian platform? I guess I omitted the hand-waving about how this attitude will somehow make the world a better place, but I am allergic to bullshit and I didn't want to touch it.

Re:Cry me a river

[drinkypoo]

What I never found in any Libertarian platform was an explanation of how were were to get this massively increased court system.

I'm sure there's a book about it, which any libertarian will tell you that we are idiots if we haven't read. I fear the answer is that it will be provided by some private interest, who accepts cash, check, and credit card.

kill drone delivery services?

[fustakrakich]

How? If I gave permission with the order, they can land on my property. They just have to hover down from 350 feet.

Exceeds state authority

[Anonymous Coward]

All airspace within the U.S. is under control of the FAA. Although the FAA allows some unlicensed use of low altitude airspace (for model aircraft, rockets, and the like), anything that's not sitting on the ground is under their regulatory authority. The supremacy clause of the constitution spells out that, in the event of a conflict between federal and state law, federal law takes priority.

Re:Exceeds state authority

[gavron]

Very true. No idea why you're modded down to 0... you're correct.

Only the FAA has jurisdiction. The California State government can pass as
many measure as it takes for them to be blue in the face, but they have no
force of law and a simple hearing removed to US District Court would
resolve that in a heartbeat.

However, politicians posturing and appearing to "do something" is what it
really is... and that's nothing new.

Ehud Gavron
FAA commercial helicopter pilot

Re:Exceeds state authority

[Maow]

Very true. No idea why you're modded down to 0... you're correct.

Not sure if you read replies, but just FYI - Anonymous Cowards' posts start at a score of 0, and logged in users with reasonable karma start at 1.

Subscribers / users on your "friends list" may have a bonus point attributed to their posts, hence start at 2, although I'm not entirely sure how this part works.

Users also have an option in their settings to assign an extra point to posts that have been moderated by category, i.e. Informative or Funny if said user is interested in pushing such posts to higher prominence in their own reading. i.e. These points aren't actually attributed to the comment poster, but to the page presented to the reading user.

Re:Exceeds state authority

[rssrss]

There are many claims of authority by regulatory bodies. Some of them are constitutional.

The FAA must rely on the grant of power in Art 1 Sec 8 of the constitution to regulate commerce among the several states.

Airliners bound for other states fly over my house every day. I concede the FAA's authority over those airplanes and their flights.

OTOH, a little drone flying barely above the treetops has a far slimmer case to be part of interstate commerce.

Federal jurisdiction over use of the air is not unlimited, and cannot be used to displace state jurisdiction on non commercial uses of airspace in realms that are clearly not part of the commercial airways.

If we look at other forms of transportation we will see a similar pattern. Federal jurisdiction over commerce does not immunize truckers from state rule about safe driving. Federal jurisdiction over navigable waters does not preclude state regulation of fishing boats and fishermen.

I personally guess that California's right to regulate the use of airspace below 500 feet outside of airport landing zones is constitutional and will be upheld if the law is enacted.

Yes, IAAL.

Pre-emption

[bl968]

The FAA should simply preempt California's unauthorized attempt, as they have the exclusive control of the air space of the United States from ground level to space; and are the only agency to establish the policies for its use.

Re:Pre-emption

[GauteL]

Is the person controlling the drone on the ground not subject to Californian regulation? Granted, if he's is situated out-of-state, he's not, but as long as he's is on the ground in California, it seems to me that his actions could be regulated by California state law. I'm a furriner though, so I may not understand the intricacies of the US.

Relation to Buffalo Bill?

[Strange Quark Star]

Who is this California Bill, and why does he want to limit commercial drones?

Mods. The parent is not a troll.

[GauteL]

.. but a legitimate point of argument in the debate. What is the point of this discussion at all if anti-drone posts gets labelled as a "troll"? Perhaps the grand-parent calling drone enthusiasts "twisted perverts" could be seen as a troll, but the parent does not include any abuse apart from what is seen in the direct quote.

I'm not sure what the difference is between a radio operated car with a camera on (surely a form of trespassing, if on your property?) and a drone flying 20 feet above it with a camera. They both have the same implications; invasion of privacy. The drone also adds risk of destruction to your property.

Drone enthusiasts can take their drones to public parks, nature or fly over their own property.

Re:Not unconstitutional

[Anonymous Coward]

Even tho bullets/stones "fly thru the air" they are not regulated under the authority of the FAA. Only AIRCRAFT are regulated (per below) and bullets/stones do not qualify as aircraft..but all drones do (hobby or commercial). The Feds are responsible (soley) for ensuring that AIRCRAFT do not cause harm to property or individuals on the ground. If CA wants to regulate using a "remote control" device by an ground-based operator perhaps they could get away with that...but they could not regulate fully automated drones (as Amazon is proposing)...that is the sole purview of the FAA.

(2) The (FAA) Administrator shall prescribe air traffic regulations on the flight of aircraft (including regulations on safe altitudes) for—
(A) navigating, protecting, and identifying aircraft;
(B) protecting individuals and property on the ground;
(C) using the navigable airspace efficiently; and
(D) preventing collision between aircraft, between aircraft and land or water vehicles, and between aircraft and airborne objects.

Unintended consequences

[ScentCone]

Whatever idiot came up with this proposal is completely uninformed.

First, they're not saying you can't fly over someone's property without permission. They're just saying you have to do it above 350 feet. Of course the FAA says you have to keep it under 400 feet, so this absurd law forces the drone operator to work closer to the general aviation deck, and to have to fuss about keeping their equipment in an unnecessarily narrow 50' band. Operating over hilly terrain? Double plus difficult for no reason.

Secondly, all this does is make what would annoy a neighbor even worse. In the vast majority of these cases, we're talking about a real estate agent (or her photographer) usually popping some small, comparatively very safe, quiet machine like a DJI Phantom 3 up into the air for a quick few minutes while it does a quick lap around a house for some exteriors that show the lay of the land, to add to a listing. In a more packed-in suburban setting, yes - for a useful perspective, the picture of the house they're listing is going to be taken from a short distance over the property line, so it's not a straight look-down a la Google.

But no. This brilliant piece of legislation means that now the photographer is going to have to use a heavier-lifting machine (larger hex or octo) that can carry a much heavier gimbal tweaked to carry a larger camera with a better sensor and a longer focal length lens. This rig will be heavier, and so the machine carrying it will be much more powerful (and, in the event of an accident, more dangerous), much louder, and much more annoying to use and to see in use. But someone selling a two million dollar house isn't going to blink at using (or hiring someone to use) such a device in order to continue to benefit from the now fully expected aerials of an expensive piece of real estate. So instead of having a humming little 4-pound plastic toy like a Phantom buzz around the house shooting perfectly good material, we'll have a 20-pound carbon fiber beastie with large CF props growling around at 350' ... and we'll have a new market for stabilized longer-focal-length camera platforms which will thrill the one-in-a-million actual creeps and paparazzi that everyone thinks this law is going to shut down.

California: for a place with so many smart people, it sure is dumb.