## Facts

- New Jersey, through the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection (NJDEP), implemented coastal permitting policies that sought a continuous public-access walkway along a 17-mile stretch of the Hudson River waterfront.
- The program operated through coastal statutes and regulations, including the Coastal Area Facility Review Act (CAFRA) and the Waterfront Development Law.
- In practice, NJDEP conditioned certain waterfront development approvals on the developer’s agreement to construct a segment of the Hudson River Walkway bordering the project and to grant public access and related easements.
- Trade associations representing builders and developers challenged the program, alleging the conditions forced permanent public-access easements and improvements on private property without compensation.
- Environmental and waterfront advocacy organizations intervened to defend the regulatory program.
- The case was decided on cross-motions for summary judgment in federal district court.

## Issues

1. Whether NJDEP’s conditioning of coastal permits on construction of a public walkway and dedication of public-access easements is a facial violation of the Takings Clause under per se physical taking, regulatory taking, or unconstitutional-conditions (exactions) theories.
2. Whether the walkway and easement conditions facially fail the “essential nexus” and “rough proportionality” requirements applicable to permit exactions.
3. Whether the program violates substantive due process or equal protection under rational-basis review.
4. Whether NJDEP lacked statutory authority under New Jersey coastal laws to impose walkway construction and public-access easements as permit conditions.

## Decision

- Plaintiffs’ motion for summary judgment was denied.
- Defendants’ and intervenors’ cross-motions for summary judgment were granted in part and denied in part.
- The court rejected the plaintiffs’ facial Takings Clause challenge and declined to hold the walkway/easement program unconstitutional on its face.
- The court held that broad facial invalidation was not warranted because the constitutionality of permit conditions depends on the development proposal and the fit between project impacts and required mitigation.
- Substantive due process and equal protection claims failed under deferential rational-basis review because the public-access and coastal-management goals were legitimate and the program was rationally related to those goals.
- State-law ultra vires challenges were generally rejected or found insufficient to invalidate the program on its face; the court recognized the agency’s general authority to require public-access conditions in coastal permitting.
- The court left open the possibility of as-applied challenges to particular permit conditions in specific permitting contexts.

## Legal Principles

- Facial challenges to land-use exaction programs require a showing that the challenged scheme is unconstitutional in nearly all applications; generalized objections and an undeveloped record are insufficient.
- Permit conditions requiring property interests for public access are evaluated under the unconstitutional-conditions framework for exactions; the condition must bear an essential nexus to legitimate governmental interests and be roughly proportional to the impacts of the proposed development.
- A compelled public-access easement is not automatically a per se physical taking when imposed as a development condition tied to legitimate coastal management objectives; the takings analysis may require project-specific evaluation.
- Regulatory takings claims under Penn Central ordinarily require fact-specific proof of economic impact, interference with investment-backed expectations, and the character of the government action; such proof is generally incompatible with broad facial attack.
- Substantive due process and equal protection challenges to economic and land-use regulation are reviewed under rational-basis standards; legitimate state interests in coastal access, recreation, and resource protection support public-access conditions on waterfront development.
- Coastal and waterfront regulation may account for the public trust character of tidelands and filled lands, supporting governmental authority to secure public access through permitting conditions.

## Conclusion

The court upheld NJDEP’s Hudson River waterfront public-access permit program against a facial constitutional attack, holding that walkway construction and easement conditions could satisfy exactions standards and rational-basis review, while reserving individualized as-applied review for particular permits.


Nat'l Ass'n of Home Builders v. N.J. Dep't of Env't Prot., 64 F. Supp. 2d 354 (D.N.J. 1999)