Check this out, a recently-published student comment on what to do about the universally-loathed (except by a certain nine former lawyers) Penn Central test to determine when an otherwise-valid police power restriction on the use of private property “goes too far” and will be deemed to be a de facto exercise of eminent domain.

In Takings, Property Rights, and the End of Penn Central, 33 Geo. Mason L. Rev. 181 (2026), the author lays out a pretty ambitious agenda:

This Comment will respond to calls from Justice Thomas to reconsider the Court’s regulatory takings doctrine. Building off the work of academics like Richard Epstein and Eric Claeys, I will argue that the Supreme Court should overturn Penn Central and adopt a new property rights takings inquiry. Under my proposed test, a government action infringing on a landowner’s fundamental rights to exclude, use, or dispose is prima facie a taking under the Takings Clause. However, the bright-line rule has four exceptions where government regulations or actions are not takings: nuisance control regulations, premises liability regulations, government entries onto private land under a license or implied license, and justifiable government searches or seizures of land under the Fourth Amendment.

Much has been written on Penn Central and regulatory takings. But this Comment’s proposal will diverge significantly from the prevailing views in the academy, which generally either advocate Penn Central’s holding or offer only modest and often inconsequential modifications. The property rights inquiry, if adopted, would entirely reform regulatory takings law and the way government goes about regulating land. It would place core common law property rights at the forefront of regulatory takings doctrine, rather than being relegated to a mere afterthought. As a practical result, government bodies will have to scrutinize each existing and proposed land regulation to determine if it is worth paying “just compensation” to infringe on a landowner’s rights.

Very worthwhile to check out this one.

Gillespie, Takings, Property Rights, and the End of Penn Central, 33 Geo. Mason L. Rev. 181 (2026)