While much of Europe grants recreational users a right to access private land, American landowners enjoy a robust right to exclude. To fully exercise this right, landowners must provide notice by posting their property. In most states, the public has an implied license to use unposted land for recreation, and other states sharply increase the sanction for trespass if the land is posted. Today, posting means physically marking property with signs or paint, but this article suggests that states should soon allow landowners to post their property by making a notation in existing property records. If current technology becomes more available, centralized posting would both reduce the landowners’ costs and provide better notice to the public. Centralized posting would also enhance the government’s ability to serve as an intermediary between landowners and recreational users, furthering the efficient use of land regardless of whether the law begins with a right of access or a right to exclude.

Citation
Rich Hynes, Posted: Notice and the Right to Exclude, 45 Arizona State Law Journal, 949–989 (2013).