That is a good point. Although personally, things like pipelines and railroads are the few places where I support eminent domain since they are necessarily continuous or they don't work. However, even though I support Keystone, this is for me a gray area because Keystone is designed not to benefit the people in the areas it traverses, but only the producers, refiners and shippers. Thus it is like a railroad that only passes through or a hospital that only treats a private clientele - not really a good argument for ED.
I don't know if they were shit offers or not, but I think in general one deserves significantly above market value (maybe double) if forced to sell simply because when one is forced to give up something for the common good, one deserves more than a willing seller because the resource is worth more to you than to the average bear. Otherwise you would be a willing seller. Unfortunately, wealthy individuals and companies have learned that just as with Congress, buying politicians gets you a discount on whatever else you want.
That has been my experience as well. Our local government tried to seize the water utility by simply condemning most of its pipes, thus picking it up on the cheap. Another time they condemned a building they wanted and paid $80k even though they had been taxing it as worth $300k. Thankfully, both times they lost badly in court.
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