[7] In land use regulations, concerns of an abutter may be given special attention, being the one most likely to suffer specific harm from a hasty, uninformed decision.
In the spirit of land use politics, even the unified voices of the concerned abutters may sound only faintly against the machinery of "progress" or well-funded special interests.
Some regulations otherwise expand or limit the participation of local owners, as where notice may be required for "anyone whose property is within 200 feet of any point of the parcel under consideration."
Contrarily, regulations may define "abutter" to include only those people who hold record title to an adjacent parcel, thus undermining the rights of tenants, associations and partial owners (e.g., mineral rights and easement owners) to be notified, let alone heard on a proposal.
This would also eliminate participation of owners of unrecorded title, such as adverse possession or those who have simply failed to record a deed or settle an estate involving the adjacent property.