Orleans, Eastham tangle over driving rules on shared Nauset Spit - Boston Globe
ORLEANS — It is one of Haley Lindahl’s favorite childhood memories: Soaring on a parasail attached to a jeep as it traversed a sublime 2½-mile barrier beach known as the Nauset Spit. The 27-year-old Orleans resident, who is pregnant, is disheartened her child might not be able to freely roam the spit, which juts out dramatically into the Atlantic. Last summer, in a move that angered Orleans residents who had driven along the entire shoreline for decades, Eastham began enforcing a ban on vehicles on its end of the beach. Now, Orleans is fighting back, asking the state to reverse the ban and formally extend Orleans’ off-road vehicle program to the full beach, all the way into Eastham. “Everyone wants to be friendly,” Lindahl’s mother, Janet, said as she lounged on the Orleans section of the spit one recent day, toes in the sand. ” Eastham and Orleans have been publicly grappling with ownership of the spit and access to it since at least 2010, although the debate reaches back further. Aimee Eckman, former chairwomen of the Eastham Board of selectmen, said that in 2008, a resident stopped her in the grocery store, alarmed that cars could drive on what was likely Eastham land. As time passed, she said, interest built among fellow selectmen for Eastham to assert its rights — and keep the vehicles off its beach. Source: www.bostonglobe.com
