In the UK this option is still illegal as you need permission from the council to live on your own land. I guess it’s sorta similar to zones in the US? You can only stay on your land for 28 days of the year otherwise. You could probably manage a while before you get found but they can demolish anything you build there and seize the property.
In the US, we do having the concept of “residential” zoning. Though I’m thinking that applies more to the structures being built there. I’m thinking building this kind of thing and living in it might not actually be illegal? Depending on what you are doing with your waste (like piss and shit) they might get you for some kind of health code violation. But barring that I think you might be able to get away with this. (But who would want to?) Maybe someone who knows better than me can weigh in.
Local ordinances and HOA CC&Rs can make it illegal to live on your own land unless you meet certain requirements, like having a specific type of permanent building (eg. no manufactured homes).
Oh for sure HOAs and CC&Rs. But assuming those aren’t in place, I’m still thinking this might be ok. And I suppose that’s a civil matter anyway, no cop would enforce that. And even if there was something on the books, I don’t think a cop would enforce that unless you were doing something else to piss them off or someone else. Like cooking meth for example.
Local ordinances can also make things like camping on private property illegal. That would be at the city level, but really an HOA is just another form of local government so I’d argue that counts too.
Isn’t the HOA civil though? Like they could assess a bunch of fine and send them to you, but they couldn’t enforce some kind of removal from your land as some kind of criminal offense the police would enforce?
I’m not a lawyer, but I know they can put enough leins on a property to take possession of it. I’m pretty sure police will also forcefully remove someone who’s violating civil trespassing laws, but again, not a lawyer.
Building it here should be fine because of how small it is, would almost certainly be seen as a temporary structure and classed as similar to a garden shed. The problem is you cannot legally live in something like that.
Health code isn’t likely to be an issue in the UK as I don’t think we have anything overly strict that would matter. Environmental health exists but that is more of a concern if you are leaving a pile of waste that is attracting rats to the extent its causing a problem to other people. Been to events that use a shit pit before. Some you shit straight into the pit and others collect it into a septic tank and dump that into a pit later while marking a fence post near the pit to avoid digging in the same location next year. Does make me wonder how long it takes to rot down, 100-200 peoples shit from a whole weekend dumped into a pit and buried.
Then again maybe it isn’t allowed and we were just doing it anyway.
I still kind of think in most places in the US, this might not be illegal. (Someone else brought up HOAs, but that’s kind of a different story.) But now I’m curious and hoping someone who knows better can weigh in.
In the USA this is illegal too but it is mostly a health thing, eg you can’t live somewhere with no place to shit because you’ll end up shitting in the river. Not that “health and safety” isn’t constantly abused to brutalize the indigent, but it does also kind of make sense to not let people live long term where they can’t shit, knowing what we know now about outhouses and groundwater.
That said, local governments in rural areas can barely keep fire departments and schools open. Nobody is checking on your vacant land unless someone complains, and they’d have to drive past fifty other shanties to get to yours.
Isn’t contaminating groundwater only an issue of you are pooping near a river, stream or well though? At a reasonable distance it takes so long for anything to move through that it’s not an issue and will just rot down instead.
Basically, it’s complicated. It depends on your soil/rock type, the water table, and the amount of poop. You want outhouses to be at least six feet deep for parasite lifecycle reasons, but at that depth you could be shitting directly into the water table and if the water is moving through cracks in the rock it could go quite far. Pooping in the top few inches of organic soil is much better for groundwater, but worse for surface water and then also hookworm can spread. And with enough people any primitive system totally breaks down.
Also, there are a lot of uneducated people. The people who owned my parent’s property before them built their outhouse directly over the stream because “water make shit go away”, I guess. In countries without sanitation people shit directly into the river or ocean for the same reason.
After a bunch of water quality data came out in the late 2000s, states and counties tightened up requirements but now to build anything you need to spend at least 10-15k USD on an “advanced” septic system which is completely out of reach for many people. It also requires electricity which could be another 10k. So you either subsidize it or people shit in the creek again.
@SOB_Van_Owen@lemm.ee mentioned composting. Laws are way behind on this. I looked into this before building septic and essentially no states around allowed it for permanent dwellings. I think Alaska and West Texas were the only regions where they still didn’t care. If you truly couldn’t afford it your best bet would be to do composting for your own health and just be illegal because you probably won’t get caught. But that means no mailbox, no address, hiding your camper, essentially boondocking on your own land out of sight. One angry neighbor and its over.
The Humanure Handbook by Joe Jenkins is a useful guide for a low-tech, sanitary, low-odor composting toilet option that is safe if correctly maintained.
In the UK this option is still illegal as you need permission from the council to live on your own land. I guess it’s sorta similar to zones in the US? You can only stay on your land for 28 days of the year otherwise. You could probably manage a while before you get found but they can demolish anything you build there and seize the property.
Or buy 13 separate plots of land and move your hovel every other fortnight.
I have wondered about that kind of thing. But 13 plots of land is going to cost you a huge amount, at that point you can buy a house.
In the US, we do having the concept of “residential” zoning. Though I’m thinking that applies more to the structures being built there. I’m thinking building this kind of thing and living in it might not actually be illegal? Depending on what you are doing with your waste (like piss and shit) they might get you for some kind of health code violation. But barring that I think you might be able to get away with this. (But who would want to?) Maybe someone who knows better than me can weigh in.
Local ordinances and HOA CC&Rs can make it illegal to live on your own land unless you meet certain requirements, like having a specific type of permanent building (eg. no manufactured homes).
Oh for sure HOAs and CC&Rs. But assuming those aren’t in place, I’m still thinking this might be ok. And I suppose that’s a civil matter anyway, no cop would enforce that. And even if there was something on the books, I don’t think a cop would enforce that unless you were doing something else to piss them off or someone else. Like cooking meth for example.
Local ordinances can also make things like camping on private property illegal. That would be at the city level, but really an HOA is just another form of local government so I’d argue that counts too.
Isn’t the HOA civil though? Like they could assess a bunch of fine and send them to you, but they couldn’t enforce some kind of removal from your land as some kind of criminal offense the police would enforce?
I’m not a lawyer, but I know they can put enough leins on a property to take possession of it. I’m pretty sure police will also forcefully remove someone who’s violating civil trespassing laws, but again, not a lawyer.
Building it here should be fine because of how small it is, would almost certainly be seen as a temporary structure and classed as similar to a garden shed. The problem is you cannot legally live in something like that.
Health code isn’t likely to be an issue in the UK as I don’t think we have anything overly strict that would matter. Environmental health exists but that is more of a concern if you are leaving a pile of waste that is attracting rats to the extent its causing a problem to other people. Been to events that use a shit pit before. Some you shit straight into the pit and others collect it into a septic tank and dump that into a pit later while marking a fence post near the pit to avoid digging in the same location next year. Does make me wonder how long it takes to rot down, 100-200 peoples shit from a whole weekend dumped into a pit and buried.
Then again maybe it isn’t allowed and we were just doing it anyway.
I still kind of think in most places in the US, this might not be illegal. (Someone else brought up HOAs, but that’s kind of a different story.) But now I’m curious and hoping someone who knows better can weigh in.
In the USA this is illegal too but it is mostly a health thing, eg you can’t live somewhere with no place to shit because you’ll end up shitting in the river. Not that “health and safety” isn’t constantly abused to brutalize the indigent, but it does also kind of make sense to not let people live long term where they can’t shit, knowing what we know now about outhouses and groundwater.
That said, local governments in rural areas can barely keep fire departments and schools open. Nobody is checking on your vacant land unless someone complains, and they’d have to drive past fifty other shanties to get to yours.
Isn’t contaminating groundwater only an issue of you are pooping near a river, stream or well though? At a reasonable distance it takes so long for anything to move through that it’s not an issue and will just rot down instead.
Basically, it’s complicated. It depends on your soil/rock type, the water table, and the amount of poop. You want outhouses to be at least six feet deep for parasite lifecycle reasons, but at that depth you could be shitting directly into the water table and if the water is moving through cracks in the rock it could go quite far. Pooping in the top few inches of organic soil is much better for groundwater, but worse for surface water and then also hookworm can spread. And with enough people any primitive system totally breaks down.
Also, there are a lot of uneducated people. The people who owned my parent’s property before them built their outhouse directly over the stream because “water make shit go away”, I guess. In countries without sanitation people shit directly into the river or ocean for the same reason.
After a bunch of water quality data came out in the late 2000s, states and counties tightened up requirements but now to build anything you need to spend at least 10-15k USD on an “advanced” septic system which is completely out of reach for many people. It also requires electricity which could be another 10k. So you either subsidize it or people shit in the creek again.
@SOB_Van_Owen@lemm.ee mentioned composting. Laws are way behind on this. I looked into this before building septic and essentially no states around allowed it for permanent dwellings. I think Alaska and West Texas were the only regions where they still didn’t care. If you truly couldn’t afford it your best bet would be to do composting for your own health and just be illegal because you probably won’t get caught. But that means no mailbox, no address, hiding your camper, essentially boondocking on your own land out of sight. One angry neighbor and its over.
The Humanure Handbook by Joe Jenkins is a useful guide for a low-tech, sanitary, low-odor composting toilet option that is safe if correctly maintained.
What about a caravan?