Cite as: 512 U. S. 374 (1994)
Stevens, J., dissenting
into discrete segments and attempt to determine whether rights in a particular segment have been entirely abrogated." Id., at 130-131. Instead, this Court focuses "both on the character of the action and on the nature and extent of the interference with rights in the parcel as a whole." Ibid. Andrus v. Allard, 444 U. S. 51 (1979), reaffirmed the nondivisibility principle outlined in Penn Central, stating that "[a]t least where an owner possesses a full 'bundle' of property rights, the destruction of one 'strand' of the bundle is not a taking, because the aggregate must be viewed in its entirety." 444 U. S., at 65-66.3 As recently as last Term, we approved the principle again. See Concrete Pipe & Products of Cal., Inc. v. Construction Laborers Pension Trust for Southern Cal., 508 U. S. 602, 644 (1993) (explaining that "a claimant's parcel of property [cannot] first be divided into what was taken and what was left" to demonstrate a compensable taking). Although limitation of the right to exclude others undoubtedly constitutes a significant infringement upon property ownership, Kaiser Aetna v. United States, 444 U. S. 164, 179-180 (1979), restrictions on that right do not alone constitute a taking, and do not do so in any event unless they "unreasonably impair the value or use" of the property. PruneYard Shopping Center v. Robins, 447 U. S. 74, 82-84 (1980).
The Court's narrow focus on one strand in the property
owner's bundle of rights is particularly misguided in a case involving the development of commercial property. As Professor Johnston has noted:
"The subdivider is a manufacturer, processer, and marketer of a product; land is but one of his raw materials. In subdivision control disputes, the developer is
3 Similarly, in Keystone Bituminous Coal Assn. v. DeBenedictis, 480 U. S. 470, 498-499 (1987), we concluded that "[t]he 27 million tons of coal do not constitute a separate segment of property for takings law purposes" and that "[t]here is no basis for treating the less than 2% of petitioners' coal as a separate parcel of property."
401
Page: Index Previous 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 NextLast modified: October 4, 2007