ABSTRACT
Each restriction on free access adopted over the years has in some way reflected a judgment about its merits as a policy. Yet evaluating the benefits and burdens of free access in any systematic, objective way is remarkably difficult. As representatives of the mining industry often and accurately point out, the erosion of the policy has usually not been the result of an overt balancing of benefits and burdens. Instead, the various decisions limiting its application have for the most part been ad hoc responses to immediate problems, in which consideration of the overall merits of free access has been substantially submerged.
