No paddle boarding in Dorchester Bay - without paying a fee

Well it's kind of like at the movies; you can't bring your own drink and have to buy what is served at the concession stand.

State law says that navigation is a protected activity.

I could understand them asking people to avoid a roped off swimming area, but the right to launch a boat is pretty much sacred on the salty shores of the Commonwealth.

http://www.mass.gov/eea/agencies/czm/program-areas...

Although the Colonial Ordinance changed the ownership of most intertidal flats from public to private, it did not transfer all property rights originally held in trust by the state. For one thing, no rights to the water itself (as distinct from the underlying lands) were relinquished by the Ordinance. Moreover, the law specifically reserved for the public the right to continue to use private tidelands for three purposes-fishing, fowling, and navigation.

Over the years, Massachusetts courts have ruled that the scope of activities on private tidelands covered by the reserved public rights of fishing, fowling, and navigation is broad, and includes all of their "natural derivatives." For example:

The right to fish includes the right to seek or take any fish, shellfish, or floating marine plants, from a vessel or on foot;
The right to navigate includes the right to conduct any activity involving the movement of a boat, vessel, float, or other watercraft, as well as the transport of people and materials and related loading and unloading activity; and
The right to fowl includes the right to hunt birds for sport as well as sustenance. (The Massachusetts Attorney General takes the position that the right of fowling also includes other ways that birds can be "used," such as birdwatching, but also notes that this issue has not yet been addressed by the courts.)

That's how swimming and private craft are excluded from Jamaica Pond's 68 acres, since it's still considered a backup water source.

Can towns do more to restrict the use of Great Ponds, such as banning swimming and boating access from town-owned shoreline?