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development limit of 30 lots. Accordingly, petitioner’s action
or inaction with respect to the trees is irrelevant in
considering whether the purported conservation easement satisfies
the requirements of section 170(h).
The attempted easement did not satisfy the historic
preservation requirement of section 170(h) because it did not
preserve a historic structure or historically important land
area. First, there was no historical structure on the Grist Mill
property to preserve, and the easement’s limitation on
development on land near the Grist Mill or Woodlawn Plantation
does not preserve the historical structures on those properties.
That remains so despite any ancillary benefit of limited
development because petitioners did not own or control those
historical structures. The legislative history is explicit that
land surrounding a historical structure, like Mount Vernon, makes
that land historically important, but proximity alone does not
provide a basis to support a claim of protection of a historical
structure. Petitioner has not shown how his proposed limitation
in the conservation easement preserved any historical structure.
We also note that petitioners are not in a position to claim
that the Grist Mill property is independently significant, like a
Civil War battlefield, as there is no evidence that anything on
the property was historically unique. The Grist Mill property is
thus a historically important land area only because of its
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