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Road moved
Posted by nate-the-surveyor on March 9, 2018 at 12:42 amCounty road moved. Got improved, lots of base, and paved.
Its about 750′ of road frontage.
Road is property line. C/L.
It moved up to 9′. Mostly about 6′. One direction.
Rd runs E-W generally. Both deeds call for rd c/l.
Surveyed some 20 yrs ago.
We can define the old location within a foot.
Does the property line move with the road?
N
Paul replied 6 years, 1 month ago 20 Members · 49 Replies- 49 Replies
No.
If no one knew the road moved then maybe but it has to be unknown so the legal fiction that it has not moved can operate. But since you know the County moved the road then the boundary stays behind. Also the County is not a party to the boundary so their actions cannot affect it.
A dedicated right-of-way does not move. A prescriptive road easement may move with the new location, but the original property line does not. The County has the right to move the road within a dedicated right-of-way. They do not have the right to widen or change the location of a prescriptive easement. All depends on the right-of-way deed or absence of a right-of-way deed.
The road would be tantamount to a disturbed monument..
I know whats the “legal thing to do”.
But, I had a sentimental moment there.
Did the margins at the back of borrowpit move?
That is what defines the location of a road.
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I say it does move, if I understand your situation, and I think I do. Regardless of specific or general rules of construction. Intent is always the underlying truth that controls. I argue both sides intended to stick with the cl regardless of it moving around. It’s an ambulatory boundary. Maybe the ROW lines move slower, maybe not at all, but that’s a different issue.
- Posted by: Duane Frymire
I say it does move, if I understand your situation, and I think I do. Regardless of specific or general rules of construction. Intent is always the underlying truth that controls. I argue both sides intended to stick with the cl regardless of it moving around. It’s an ambulatory boundary. Maybe the ROW lines move slower, maybe not at all, but that’s a different issue.
So, are you saying that the private land owners on either side of the line intend to allow a third party (the county) to move their common boundary line wherever and whenever it desires?
Funny you posted this. Just had a call from a land owner. He needs to know where his property line is. People are driving off of the road in to the ditch to miss the potholes and rocks. The road is getting wider and apparently someone hit his fence. Of course he calls the county and they tell him that he can fence 12′ from the center of the road, so he did (before it was hit). He calls me for information. I pull up the plat and he is telling me this and I laugh and tell him the county is incorrect, unless it is a prescriptive easement. But his property is in a subdivision and the roads have a dedicated width. His is 60 foot. But I also inform him that it isn’t 30 foot from the center of the road. It all depends on where it is built. I try to convince him to have it surveyed so I can definitely mark his property line but he has it figured out now and hangs up. Thanks to the county, I might be getting some work unless the ROW moves with the road. ? ? ?
roadbeds are sometimes marking the centerline of a road and sometimes not.
- Posted by: Nate The Surveyor
But, I had a sentimental moment there.
well, I suppose that means there’ll be another Little Natester showing up in about 40 weeks…. ?
Nate,
I think you knew the answer already. I know there are some strange opinions about ROWs on here, but to claim the actions of a county bulldozer operater can effect the property line between two private parties is crazy talk.
Nate,
I think you knew the answer already. I know there are some strange opinions about ROWs on here, but to claim the actions of a county bulldozer operater can effect the property line between two private parties is crazy talk.
- Posted by: Duane Frymire
I say it does move, if I understand your situation, and I think I do. Regardless of specific or general rules of construction. Intent is always the underlying truth that controls. I argue both sides intended to stick with the cl regardless of it moving around. It’s an ambulatory boundary. Maybe the ROW lines move slower, maybe not at all, but that’s a different issue.
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Alliquat,
Tis true, yes, tis true…
But, it also brings up the issue of surveys, I’ve seen, that obviously, poorly defined the road… They were trying to keep the numbers out of the road location. They only approximately showed pi’s, and those were adjusted to make the acreage about right.
Now I understand that old codger… With a grandfathered pls #.
N
Yes, often the current road location is the best evidence of the location at the time of the grant.
Duane is suggesting a road could be a natural monument. If the road separates two properties and it moves imperceptibly over time I think it’s possible because everyone needs access to the road.
If the County comes in with a bulldozer and shoves the road over 20′ then that could be viewed as avulsion.
- Posted by: Dave Karoly
Duane is suggesting a road could be a natural monument. If the road separates two properties and it moves imperceptibly over time I think it’s possible because everyone needs access to the road.
If the County comes in with a bulldozer and shoves the road over 20′ then that could be viewed as avulsion.
Right, this isn’t a meandering water boundary.
If the road isn’t mathematically defined, though, and imperceptibly moves over a long period of time, and no one can definitively place the original location of the road, then maybe.
- Posted by: Duane Frymire
I say it does move, if I understand your situation, and I think I do. Regardless of specific or general rules of construction. Intent is always the underlying truth that controls. I argue both sides intended to stick with the cl regardless of it moving around. It’s an ambulatory boundary. Maybe the ROW lines move slower, maybe not at all, but that’s a different issue.
Duane (I think), is saying that:
County roads foreman, was out there, talking with landowners. Landowners agreed. “Fix this road”. Via their consent, and watching construction, and approving the process, as it occured, that it’s tantamount to acquiescence.
That vie their FAILURE to object, to the fact it was moving a little, (5 to 8 ft is not a large movement), that although it was the county dozer, and road grader, that the COUNTY was doing the will of the landowners. Thus, it is binding as a moving of the boundary.
I take the position that it is best, and most legal, to exchange qc deeds, now we have ratified their tacit approval, and title “remains clean”.
If I use old old c/l, then it would be a little more legal.
If I use new c/l, AND document it on my plat, that the NEW c/l will (or has already) “ripened” into the boundary.
So, no matter what I do, DOCUMENT IT.
Leave footsteps, and reasoning behind.
Nate
- Posted by: Scotland
….. People are driving off of the road in to the ditch to miss the potholes and rocks. The road is getting wider and apparently someone hit his fence. ? ? ?
Good Grief!
Where do you live, Wisconsin?
It took me a long time to consider how operations of law move boundaries. Researching the nuances of how each State handles this movement is a neverending pursuit. There are very few absolutes, but one applies here.
As a Surveyor it is never correct to inject my assumptions to effect or interrupt transfer between owners. A call to a non-ambulatory object is a call to it’s location at the time of writing. No reasonable person would assume that roads ‘move’ and asserting owners believed that to be true without evidence is an invitation to court and or the Board…
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