Question about hunting downtown Thomasville, NC

ncsilverspider

Sr. Member
Jul 24, 2011
257
111
Rowan County, NC
Detector(s) used
Whites Prizim III
Primary Interest:
All Treasure Hunting
Does anyone on here know the laws, if any, of metal detecting downtown Thomasville? Specifically the strip of grass between the road and the double track railroad that runs through there? Obviously you can't hunt along the RR ROW but can you even hunt those strips at all? Any ideas ???? :icon_scratch:

Blessings,
ncsilverspider

"For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also." Matt. 6:21”
 

Does anyone on here know the laws, if any, of metal detecting downtown Thomasville? Specifically the strip of grass between the road and the double track railroad that runs through there? Obviously you can't hunt along the RR ROW but can you even hunt those strips at all? Any ideas ???? :icon_scratch:

Blessings,
ncsilverspider

"For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also." Matt. 6:21”

I just looked at this on google satellite. This appears to be either A) Road right of way, or B) Railroad right of way. Thus anything you could find in that city's muni parks rules would not apply. Because it's not a "park". And I HIGHLY DOUBT there's some muni. code that says anything about detecting elsewhere. You're certainly welcome to check (if their muni code, charter, laws, etc.... are on the web). But I bet it's simply silent on the subject. Hence not disallowed.

Or you can knock yourself silly and try to find out where the RR right-of-way ends. By studying assessor's parcel maps, hiring surveyors, blah blah. Then get ahold of the railroad Co. and ask their permission, blah blah. But ... seriously now ... do you think anyone cares ? A look at the google man-on-the-street view of that shows that it appears to be just normal pedestrian walk zones (like an enlarged parking strip or grassy median).

If I were you, I'd just go. Don't overthink it :)
 

Do a little reading. https://library.municode.com/nc/thomasville/codes/code_of_ordinances

I skimmed a bit and from what I can gather (and I did not dig very deeply), the "sidewalk" is legally defined as the curb or edge of the road to the adjoining property line, meaning that that grass strip is technically part of the sidewalk. I saw a few prohibitions that were obviously corrective actions (no storing merchandise, no playing football, etc.) but nothing about metal detecting. You're probably fine, but I'd do a bit of my own research before trusting some stranger on the internet.
 

Great link Dave. It has a key-word search function. I just did key word "metal". @ all the places where the word "metal" appears, none have anything to do with detectors or detecting. Next I tried variations of "detector" and "detecting". Same results: nothing to do with us (just stuff about smoke detectors, etc....).

Hence not disallowed. Go get 'em ncsilverspider :)

Thanks guys! A friend of mine owns a shop down there. I'm paying him a visit tomorrow and will probably hit the strip across from his store. Lovely place to watch trains as well. I appreciate all your looking it up and will keep you posted! :hello2:
 

Well, did a little hunt of the area across from my friends store while taking some train pics and came up with 30 cents modern clad, couple bullet shells, one flattened penny from a train and a key. So nothing fantastic :-\
 

Weather wasn't the best, but I did catch two freights while hunting, one northbound and one southbound. So it wasn't a total bust :)

DSCF9125.JPG DSCF9128.JPG
 

The land between sidewalks and streets and roads belong to our towns and cities. Therefore you can search these lands.
 

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