this happened last weekend and its been bugging me. i was flying at a public beach, not a state park just a regular town beach, airspace was fine i checked on the app before i went out. a cop came up and told me i needed a permit to fly there and honestly i didnt know enough to push back so i just packed up and left. i have my part 107 and the airspace was class G uncontrolled. im not even sure if the officer was right or if the town actually has an ordinance or if he was just kind of guessing. how do you guys handle situations like this? i dont want to be that guy who argues with police but i also dont want to just give up a legal flight because someone assumed it wasnt allowed

honestly you probably did the right thing in the moment just by leaving without making it a confrontation. but going forward i'd recommend looking up the municipal code for any town beach you want to fly at before you show up. a lot of small towns have passed drone ordinances in the last few years and theyre not always easy to find but they are usually on the town's website under like parks or code of ordinances. if the airspace is clear AND theres no local ordinance then you're generally fine but the cop may not know that and the side of a beach is not the place to try to educate someone. i keep a printout of the relevant regs in my bag now just in case, probably never gonna use it but makes me feel better

municipalities can technically regulate takeoff and landing on their property even when the FAA controls the airspace above it, thats kind of the loophole that lets all these local rules exist. whether that specific cop knew about any actual ordinance or was just making assumptions i have no way to know obviously but its a real thing. the sunnyvale vs FAA preemption stuff is still kind of unsettled legal territory depending on what state youre in too. not saying you did anything wrong just that the answer is almost never as simple as checking airspace on B4UFLY