so this is kind of a rant but also genuinely asking because im still not sure where i went wrong. drove about an hour to this state park last weekend specifically to get some footage of the lake and the fall colors and when i got there a ranger came over pretty much immediately and told me i couldnt fly. i had checked the FAA map beforehand and it didnt show any restricted airspace over that area, no orange circles nothing.

turns out apparently state parks have their own rules that are completely separate from FAA airspace stuff and some of them just ban drones entirely regardless of what the federal maps say. i had no idea these were even two different things. is there like a central place to find out about these kind of ground-based restrictions or do you just have to call every park individually before you go? feels like a lot

ugh this is one of those things that trips up almost everyone at some point. yeah the FAA airspace rules and local/state regulations are completely separate layers and the FAA map only shows you the airspace piece. state parks, national parks, tribal lands, local ordinances ? none of that shows up on the sectional charts or in LAANC at all. national parks are actually a full federal ban across all of them which is at least consistent, but state parks vary wildly by state and sometimes even park to park within the same state.

honestly the only reliable method ive found is to look up the specific park on their official website and ctrl+f for drone or UAS, and if theres nothing there just call the ranger station. annoying but thats kind of where we are with this stuff right now. some of the drone community sites try to crowdsource this info but its always a bit out of date

same thing happend to me at a reservoir last spring, checked everything and thought i was good. the ranger was actually pretty cool about it and just told me to pack it up but said i could apply for a special use permit through the parks department if i wanted to come back and shoot. never followed up on it but apparently thats a thing at least in some states