Power Lines and Land Value

This study attempts to detect whether power lines, power line towers, or both have an impact on the selling price of proximate residential land and to measure the magnitude of these impacts if they exist. Secondly, it attempts to determine whether any impact which is found to exist is diminished through time possibly as the growth of trees obscures the view of towers and lines, as attitudes change, or as uncertainty about the effects diminishes. Finally, the extent to which the impact extends beyond lots with an easement is considered. Throughout, the focus is on the value of land even though the use of developed property sales would ordinarily preclude such a focus. The approach is that of a hedonic price index in which selling price is Cobb-Douglas function of a number of property characteristics with land area being just one of the characteristics. By shifting the other property characteristic variables, it is possible to obtain predictions of land value alone.