Where, exactly, I wonder, is the boundary between York and Lancaster counties?
I spotted a Peregrine Falcon sitting under the route 30 bridge a few years ago. I reported the sighting on the internet and received an inquiry from the official tabulator of birds for York county: was the bird in York County? I told him if he could tell me exactly where the boundary was in the river, I could answer his question. He said he did not know.
Thus was born my quest to find that exact spot.
Most know the river belongs to Lancaster County. But most are unaware of what the legal definition of 'river' is under Pennsylvania law.
Under Pennsylvania water borders law, the 'river' roughly means the riverbed, not the water. Where as the water level rises and falls, and so touches dry land at various points, the riverbed is fixed, and so the boundary, once determined, is stationary throughout the year, regardless of the fluctuations in the water level.
Water border law and riparian (waterfront) land owner rights is grossly divided between tidal and non-tidal waters. Non-tidal is further subdivided into either navigable or non-navigable. The Susquehanna River has been declared by the courts to be a navigable fresh water river. This is the body of law that must be looked to for the answer.
Reduced to a nutshell, the two counties have agreed that York County is responsible for west shore boat launches. So until a typical boat, carrying a typical load, launched from the west shore lifts off the riverbed bottom, it is still touching land and therefore is still in York County. Thus the exact point at which the hull lifts off the riverbed marks the border between the counties. However, there are additional pre-conditions that must be met and exceptions that must be considered.
First, since Pennsylvania is one of only six states that use the low water mark (all the other states use the high water mark) to set the fixed boundary for property owners, you must launch your boat on a day when the river is at its lowest level of the entire year. And it must be a 'normal' year -- i.e., a year of average rainfall, having neither extreme flood nor extreme drought conditions.
Second, the construction of man made structures, such as dams, does not change the boundary. Thus Excelon still pays taxes to York County for the lands submerged when Conowingo Dam was built. So, the reservoirs must be drained before launching the boat. Of course this is not practical. So historical maps are perhaps the last recourse.
Third, not all of the river is set aside for navigation. Thus marinas can exist so long as they do not obstruct commercial uses. In other words, that part of the river west of the shipping channel can be used by York county marinas. The owner of the Lake Clark Marina told of some Lancaster revenue agents who tried to collect some taxes from him, but they relented, as they should, because the law is on the owner's side: all his inventory (boats) sitting in the water offshore from his dock, but back of the shipping channel, are legally in York County. Besides he has no land deeded in Lancaster County. How could Lancaster send a tax bill to a York County address?
In fact, it is only that part of the river which lies between the western edge of the shipping channel and the Lancaster shore that can be said with confidence to lie entirely within Lancaster County. A marina based on the York County side can use what's called the 'harbor' section of the riverbed – that portion of the riverbed that sits between the low water mark launch point and the edge of the shipping channel -- to store its boat inventory. Should one of these marina boats catch fire, it would be the legal responsibility of York County fire companies to put it out.
More practically, a surveyor could find the spot by studying historical river data. The low water mark yields little in the way of biological or geological markers compared to the high water mark. Some courts have solved this by using statistical regression based on the last 100 years of river gauge readings. Regression is preferred over simple mean average since the border can shift gradually with the slow forces of nature, such as erosion or siltification, but not with rapid upheavals such as hurricanes or earthquakes. For the latter, the original border remains unaltered. But by the gradual forces of nature, the legal border shifts over time. Thus it must be periodically re-surveyed. Water front land owners can gain or lose land by these processes, and they willingly assume this risk when they purchase waterfront property.
From the above, we can see that much of York County is almost always submerged beyond the west shore line, as the river retreats down to the low water mark perhaps only once every other year, and then it may only do so for one day. Binomial statistics would mean that quite often one would have to wait three or four years before the river ever recedes beyond the low water mark. Thus it can be a long time before the boundary is actually exposed and visible.
Looking at topographical maps, there are many places where the river is very shallow, and additionally many places where spits of under water land protrude quite far eastward into the riverbed. Thus a bird seen flying over the water cannot be safely ascribed to either county, as there are many points where the low water mark is closer to the Lancaster side than it is to the York side, due to the shallowness and slope of the riverbed running west to east.
One such place in particular is the lower half of Lake Clark. Historical maps show that over half of the lower section of Lake Clark is actually in York County. And this is ignoring any spits, etc.
There are many other legal points beyond this treatise that can be explored. The simplest way for me to illustrate these is with a map I have made from topographic maps drawn in the early 1900s, before Lake Clarke was formed.
Fig. 1 is such an illustration of the Wrightsville-Columbia section of the river. The red line marks an estimate of the low water mark, which by studying the last several years of river gauge data, appears to be about 6-to-7 feet below the high water mark. The blue line marks an estimate of where the typical boat would lift off the bottoms were it to be launched. This is roughly one and a half feet in depth. The green line marks what is called the thalweg - the deepest rut in the river.
The orange line marks to location of today's route 30 bridge, which was constructed after this map was drawn.
Common law proclaims the thalweg the default boundary. The area west of the blue line can almost certainly be considered in York County. The area between the blue and the green - i.e., the 'harbor' area - would likely also stand up in court. It is only that area east of the green line - i.e., the thalweg - that is indisputably in Lancaster County.
Of course today we have GPS systems that can precisely tell you where you are. You could theoretically take your lat-lon measurements and plot them on this illustration to determine which county you are in.
From this illustration I can see that the falcon, perched about one-third of the span from the west shore, was indeed in York County, even though the Lancaster Newspapers boasted otherwise.
One final thought. In reality, it is the courts that have final jurisdiction in boundary disputes. And so I may state with metaphysical certitude that the exact location of the boundary between York and Lancaster Counties is precisely where the judge tells you it is in his ruling. Of course he will follow the precedents, described earlier, in reaching his decision. Much of the boundary has never been litigated, and so much of the boundary is still, 250+ years after being codified, up for discussion and dispute.
I spotted a Peregrine Falcon sitting under the route 30 bridge a few years ago. I reported the sighting on the internet and received an inquiry from the official tabulator of birds for York county: was the bird in York County? I told him if he could tell me exactly where the boundary was in the river, I could answer his question. He said he did not know.
Thus was born my quest to find that exact spot.
Most know the river belongs to Lancaster County. But most are unaware of what the legal definition of 'river' is under Pennsylvania law.
Under Pennsylvania water borders law, the 'river' roughly means the riverbed, not the water. Where as the water level rises and falls, and so touches dry land at various points, the riverbed is fixed, and so the boundary, once determined, is stationary throughout the year, regardless of the fluctuations in the water level.
Water border law and riparian (waterfront) land owner rights is grossly divided between tidal and non-tidal waters. Non-tidal is further subdivided into either navigable or non-navigable. The Susquehanna River has been declared by the courts to be a navigable fresh water river. This is the body of law that must be looked to for the answer.
Reduced to a nutshell, the two counties have agreed that York County is responsible for west shore boat launches. So until a typical boat, carrying a typical load, launched from the west shore lifts off the riverbed bottom, it is still touching land and therefore is still in York County. Thus the exact point at which the hull lifts off the riverbed marks the border between the counties. However, there are additional pre-conditions that must be met and exceptions that must be considered.
First, since Pennsylvania is one of only six states that use the low water mark (all the other states use the high water mark) to set the fixed boundary for property owners, you must launch your boat on a day when the river is at its lowest level of the entire year. And it must be a 'normal' year -- i.e., a year of average rainfall, having neither extreme flood nor extreme drought conditions.
Second, the construction of man made structures, such as dams, does not change the boundary. Thus Excelon still pays taxes to York County for the lands submerged when Conowingo Dam was built. So, the reservoirs must be drained before launching the boat. Of course this is not practical. So historical maps are perhaps the last recourse.
Third, not all of the river is set aside for navigation. Thus marinas can exist so long as they do not obstruct commercial uses. In other words, that part of the river west of the shipping channel can be used by York county marinas. The owner of the Lake Clark Marina told of some Lancaster revenue agents who tried to collect some taxes from him, but they relented, as they should, because the law is on the owner's side: all his inventory (boats) sitting in the water offshore from his dock, but back of the shipping channel, are legally in York County. Besides he has no land deeded in Lancaster County. How could Lancaster send a tax bill to a York County address?
In fact, it is only that part of the river which lies between the western edge of the shipping channel and the Lancaster shore that can be said with confidence to lie entirely within Lancaster County. A marina based on the York County side can use what's called the 'harbor' section of the riverbed – that portion of the riverbed that sits between the low water mark launch point and the edge of the shipping channel -- to store its boat inventory. Should one of these marina boats catch fire, it would be the legal responsibility of York County fire companies to put it out.
More practically, a surveyor could find the spot by studying historical river data. The low water mark yields little in the way of biological or geological markers compared to the high water mark. Some courts have solved this by using statistical regression based on the last 100 years of river gauge readings. Regression is preferred over simple mean average since the border can shift gradually with the slow forces of nature, such as erosion or siltification, but not with rapid upheavals such as hurricanes or earthquakes. For the latter, the original border remains unaltered. But by the gradual forces of nature, the legal border shifts over time. Thus it must be periodically re-surveyed. Water front land owners can gain or lose land by these processes, and they willingly assume this risk when they purchase waterfront property.
From the above, we can see that much of York County is almost always submerged beyond the west shore line, as the river retreats down to the low water mark perhaps only once every other year, and then it may only do so for one day. Binomial statistics would mean that quite often one would have to wait three or four years before the river ever recedes beyond the low water mark. Thus it can be a long time before the boundary is actually exposed and visible.
Looking at topographical maps, there are many places where the river is very shallow, and additionally many places where spits of under water land protrude quite far eastward into the riverbed. Thus a bird seen flying over the water cannot be safely ascribed to either county, as there are many points where the low water mark is closer to the Lancaster side than it is to the York side, due to the shallowness and slope of the riverbed running west to east.
One such place in particular is the lower half of Lake Clark. Historical maps show that over half of the lower section of Lake Clark is actually in York County. And this is ignoring any spits, etc.
There are many other legal points beyond this treatise that can be explored. The simplest way for me to illustrate these is with a map I have made from topographic maps drawn in the early 1900s, before Lake Clarke was formed.
Fig. 1 is such an illustration of the Wrightsville-Columbia section of the river. The red line marks an estimate of the low water mark, which by studying the last several years of river gauge data, appears to be about 6-to-7 feet below the high water mark. The blue line marks an estimate of where the typical boat would lift off the bottoms were it to be launched. This is roughly one and a half feet in depth. The green line marks what is called the thalweg - the deepest rut in the river.
The orange line marks to location of today's route 30 bridge, which was constructed after this map was drawn.
Common law proclaims the thalweg the default boundary. The area west of the blue line can almost certainly be considered in York County. The area between the blue and the green - i.e., the 'harbor' area - would likely also stand up in court. It is only that area east of the green line - i.e., the thalweg - that is indisputably in Lancaster County.
Of course today we have GPS systems that can precisely tell you where you are. You could theoretically take your lat-lon measurements and plot them on this illustration to determine which county you are in.
From this illustration I can see that the falcon, perched about one-third of the span from the west shore, was indeed in York County, even though the Lancaster Newspapers boasted otherwise.
One final thought. In reality, it is the courts that have final jurisdiction in boundary disputes. And so I may state with metaphysical certitude that the exact location of the boundary between York and Lancaster Counties is precisely where the judge tells you it is in his ruling. Of course he will follow the precedents, described earlier, in reaching his decision. Much of the boundary has never been litigated, and so much of the boundary is still, 250+ years after being codified, up for discussion and dispute.
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