Re: [OT] Holy Over-regulation, Batman!

Rhino <no_offline_contact@example.com> wrote:

I was just watching the latest episode of Tim Traveller, this one
featuring an exotic chateau in southwest France:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h1Vx-7pfzLE [5 minutes]

I was astonished to discover that, in France, you need the government's
permission to paint your front door a different colour! (He's not clear
which level of government needs to give consent.)

Call me crazy but that seems like a massive case of government overreach
to me. Why on earth should any level of government be able to forbid you
to change the colour you paint your own door?

There are massive restrictions on property ownership, and the property
is owned subject to easements, air rights, mineral oil and gas rights,
building and fire codes, zoning, CCRs, etc. Members of a condo/co-op/
homeowners association do not control the outside of their units, like
door color.

If there's a historic district, then building facades must be maintained
to imitate whatever historic period they are from. In the northeast, for
instance, there's a certain off-white color that everyone is expected to
use on the facade because that color was most commonly used, allegedly,
when these buildings were built. In truth it's because there's an
expectation that that's the color without regard to actual history nor
the color the building had been painted in for significant periods.

Now, it's possible to live outside a homeowners' assocation and historic
districts and without building codes regulating this but it's hardly the
case that these restrictions are unusual.