An earlier piece I wrote on this topic:
https://cos-mobile.blogspot.com/2015/04/autombile-enthusiasts-need-to-save-off.html
I am a long time car & roads enthusiast (yes, that includes trains, but that is a topic for another post).
I had to sell my 1972 "Lemans" to a friend in 2005, because I no longer had safe storage. Sure a driveway, but alas only a 2 rather than 3 or more car garage, and with numerous tall pine trees ready and waiting for a storm to cause them to crash down and crush anything sitting in the driveway.
In 2016, my Dad, the attorney Warren J. Willinger succumbed to cancer from a botched colon removal surgery, performed October 2015 at NY Presbyterian near the GW Bridge.
Because of the high living expenses in Mt Kisco, NY, including a 21K annual property tax, Mom and I elected to move to the family second home, a 1600 foot condo unit in the San Elijo hills recent development on San Marcos, California.
At that time, I had to move my partially restored 1970 Trans Am from NY to Ca, and I had to send my recently purchased 1972 "Luxury Lemans 4 door no center side post hardtop, purchased in Texas as well, without its original engine. A good friend, known since 1980 and long term Pontiac enthusiast, took in these two cars, before later having them transferred to a storage facility near LA. Having previously owned a 1970 GTO, I had been offered the opportunity to purchase a 1972 Luxury Lemans 2 door hardtop no center side post, as a second hobby car to essentially make into a GTO by adding the appropriate parts. But since building such a "clone" GTO would cost as much as doing a real factory GTO, I declined the offer, having that thought followed by a secondary thought, of building a GTO from an alternative Lemans body style, to with the 4 door no b pillar 4 door hardtop (I also like the wagons, alas not made as a "hardtop"). I was aware of the Pontiac Lemans 4 door hardtops from the brochures, though cant recall ever seeing one on the road, nor anywhere. So I figure, lets find a 1970, 1971 or 1972 , offered as the standard (ugly door panel) Lemans, and the Lemans Sport (nice GTO style door panels) for 1970-1971. Or a 1972, weirdly offered ONLY as a so called Luxury Lemans with silly added lower chrome trim that obscures the car's lower coke bottle line introduced for 1969 & 1969, also great cars, particularly the 1969 with swapped in 1968 grills with an added GTO endura front bumper.
Seeing how weirdly obscure these 4 door hardtop Pontiac intermediates were, I purchased a 1970 Lemans from New Jersey, in May 2019, and another 1972 Luxury Lemans from the northeastern U.S. - in late August or early September 2019, having that latter car shipped to me in San Elijo/San Marcos - a car with severe but highly localized rust damage, and well worth the money to me as a complete running car.
Mom and I were dissatisfied with the small square footage of the condo, and particularly the piss poor respect for building spacings, (others were 30-40 feet but our a mere 22 feet) making it impossible to pull these cars straight into the garage, especially if the left space was occupied.
In May 2019 we start locking about 6 miles to the northwest. Yuck, Tiny house lot sizes. NOT say 1/2, 1/3 or 1/4 acre, but 7300 square feet. By early 2020 we start looking at Temicula (inland empire). Yuck, same nonsense. So by late summer 2020 we drive further to Victorville. Wow, some decent size lots, but ONLY with moon crater dirt roads. And anything with paved roads is again the same nonsensical bullshit. And made worse with these builders all choosing to offer the single story houses with ZERO attic space, you known high ceilings with a shallow pitched roof. And back yards bare;y 30 feet deep.
So I turn to Zillow, and Mom says "NORTH CAROLINA".
WOW!
1 1/3 acres lots.
Houses with GOOD architecture, generous roof space.
But what? A covenant that says NO "junk" vehicles allowed anywhere upon the property, even indoors.
We keep looking. We find a listing in early December 2020, a house that had been offered and sold that previous October, but the deal failed.
House has a nice detached rear garage, 30 feet deep, pretty through alas a potential tinderbox, and am told that metal garages are not allowed.
I check the county regulations, am allowed to keep unregistered/interoperable cars indoors, and registered cars outdoors upon concrete. This is actually superior to other places as I have since found, which prohibit any such unregistered cars anywhere on the property, or limit that to only ONE such car, even if indoors (sadly the case in southern Maryland). I look at other places, and see that the outer shore (Delmarva) is considerably more reasonable. One may store such cars indoors or outdoors as long as they are shielded from public view. But quite weirdly, when I expand my jurisdictional search to western Maryland, all I see so far are the ridiculous ban on having more than ONE such car, indoors.
What organization is behind such ridiculous, unreasonable and unjustified statues/regulations?
It reeks as a conspiracy to drive the wasteful scrap-page of our automotive members of the family.
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