The ideal place to watch for meteors would be the beach -- what's the point of living on an island as I do if you can't go watch meteors from the beach?

G*dm east coast.

I'm used to the west coast, where huge stretches of the coastline are in public ownership -- state or local parks. Virtually all beaches are. That's certainly the case in Oregon where by law the entire sandy beach is public property. Even in crowded LA, most of the oceanfront is in public property. Moreover, those public beaches are pretty much open access. Certainly the relatively lonely beaches of OR/WA are unregulated, mostly with free parking lots. And if you want to walk on Redondo or Laguna beach at midnight, fine.

Not so here.

A large majority of the shoreline is in private ownership, which extends right down to the water. Another large fraction is in town beaches where access is limited to town residents, or in private communal beaches owned by something like a country club, or a homeowners association.

The 15% or so in state beaches, wildlife refuges, etc is open to the public, but almost always with a parking fee and more importantly, during daylight hours only. As in as it gets dark, they announce over loudspeakers that "the beach is now closed", and they do patrol and will ticket you if parked there and issue a citiation if they find you walking on the beach.

I'm trying to think of where I could legally be at the shore at midnight anywhere nearby, and frankly I can't come up with anyplace at all. Well, the harbor seawall and docks in downtown Newport, but the light pollution makes that pointless.