As difficult as it may be to accept, it is time to let the fight for Cedar Beach go.

A portion of the beach is open to the public. The road to access it, however, is private property. The battle to open road access to the public is in the court system, waiting on a ruling from the judge — a decision that will surely be appealed.

The problem here is that the road is private property. At one time, access had been granted for people to walk across this private property to get to the beach, but that is no longer the case. According to testimony in the recent court hearings, multiple attempts have been made by property owners to restrict access and post it as private property, moves ignored as people continued to — as they historically have, with and without permission — access the beach. It should also be pointed out that the beach is accessible by boat, although that means a person needs to have a watercraft to reach Cedar Beach shores.

Attempts have been made by the town of Harpswell to open that access up; it even negotiated to purchase the road that came to no avail when the property owners and municipality had very different estimations of the value of the property.

The back and forth went on and on, while the neighbors who want access to Cedar Beach filed lawsuits, and made side agreements with other neighbors, and even purchased a second parcel from the property owners in question. Short of handing over a million dollars, Harpswell and the neighborhood associations have tried to accommodate the requests of the property owners.

But the road is the sticking point, because without the road, people can’t get to the beach.

Some would argue that the town has had another option the whole time, that is, they could have simply seized the road completely by eminent domain, and given the property owners a fraction of what they were offering. It’s even likely the town would have won out in the probably legal fight that would have ensued if that’s the route it had taken.

But Harpswell didn’t do that as it tried to come to an agreement with the property owners. The result has been no pact and a continued restriction of the road by the property owners.

It’s unfortunate the situation has gotten to this point. It’s too bad that the property owners are refusing to continue the tradition of allowing people to walk across their property to get to a beach.

But … that’s their prerogative. It’s their private property and it’s their choice whether or not to allow public access. Like it or not, property owners should be allowed to make that choice. We may not like it or agree with it, but the reality of the situation is that we don’t have a say.

It’s not a matter of the town deciding who is more important — the property owners who don’t spend a bulk of their time on the property that blocks access or the people who live here year-round — because it’s not a town decision. Harpswell officials have tried and been unsuccessful in obtaining access, they shouldn’t seize the private property for beach access.

It’s in the hands of the courts now and, regardless of the decision that is rendered, the parties involved are expecting an appeal. When the final legal wrangling is over, then we’ll know whether there will be road access to Cedar Beach or not.

While it’s true that there are kids growing up in Harpswell without enjoying Cedar Beach, that the town residents who do live here year-round are having the easiest access eliminated by folks who do not spend much time here at all, there are other beaches available in Harpswell. There are places where you can find sandy shores, places where you can dip your toes in the warm waters of the tide pools, places where families can gather and create new traditions. We may not like change, we may not like the selfishness of some from away, but property owners do have rights and they need to be respected.

It may not be the way life should be, but that’s just the way life is.