It’s true that road surface change can be a good indicator of a boundary, but as you say sharing or outsourcing does happen.
But we have also seen signs, rubbish bins and other sort of hardware placed on the wrong side.
And enclaves in itself are rarely local copes of the motherland as they may share currencies, phone systems etc with their host country.
Jesper
Fra:
BoundaryPoint@yahoogroups.com [mailto:BoundaryPoint@yahoogroups.com] På vegne af L. A. Nadybal
Sendt: 1. september 2005 02:57
Til: BoundaryPoint@yahoogroups.com
Emne: [BoundaryPoint] Re: Where is
this German exclave in Belgium?
Dear Hugh,
Glad you enjoy our company.
De jure, we don't have answers. I have the
treaty, and by the end of
the first week of Sept, I'll try to email you
scans of the text and
accompanying map. The map is not
detailed at all - you won't find
the answers there.
De jure, the Germans keep the roads up where there
are German lands on
the west side of the tracks. You can
see the reflector side markers
are German as threy pass under the arches of the
railway bridges, and
the pavement doesn't change for the small stretch
under the bridges
themselves. That in itself wouldn't let you
draw conclusions as to
the de facto assumption of sovereignty - because
the Germans, for all
we know, send the Belgians a bill for the work
they do on the twenty
foot stretches of highway under the bridges.
At grade crossings, the
pavement and markers also don't change, and it is
clear that the roads
crossing the tracks are in Belgium for the width
of the railway bed.
I don't recall noticing, though, what country's warning/crossing
lights and gates come down across the
tracks. I guess that would
depend on where they were installed - close to the
tracks (within the
width of the Bahnkoerper), then Belgian - further
away from the
tracks, then German. I guess.
In April I'll have time to make more visits to
local officials to see
what I can determine as to who determines when
repairs/maintenance is
necessary and who contracts for it and pays.
I have a feeling,
though, that the answers will lie in the federal
offices of Belgium
and Germany.
Regards
Len Nadybal
Washington DC