In 1940, a the section of Monroe Street between 1st and 2nd street in a nearby town was closed by city ordinance because the Corps of Engineers was constructing a floodwall across it.?ÿ I haven't seen the ordinance, but the City Engineer looked at it and says that all it says is that the street is closed.?ÿ Jefferson Street is to the east, Madison Street is to the west.
My client owns the 2 blocks either side of Monroe Street between the floodwall and 2nd Street.?ÿ The description in the deed is for 2 tracts, each tract being one of the blocks, each being described as bounded on the north by the floodwall, the south by 2nd street, the east by Jefferson Street (Tract I),or the west by Madison (Tract II). The boundary on the Monroe Street side in each description only says "bounded by Monroe Street, if extended".?ÿ There is no separate description for the portion of Monroe that was closed.?ÿ There have been several owners of the property since 1940.?ÿ All deeds have the same description.?ÿ
I"ve pointed this out to the owners and the City, waiting to hear back from them.?ÿ Some are thinking that the strip automatically went to the adjoiners when it was closed and a deed wasn't necessary.?ÿ I'm thinking there should be a deed to clean it up.?ÿ How would it be handled where you are located??ÿ Would you include the strip in a boundary survey based on the description in the deed?
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It depends on the laws in your state. Massachusetts requires a formal "discontinuance" action by municipal or county authorities before the underlying "fee" ownership reverts to the adjacent owners. There is a statute that covers how the wording of deed descriptions along roads (and rivers and other "linear monuments") are to be interpreted. This statute supersedes the common law rules that were applied previously. (If the state discontinues a highway, it becomes a county or, in the absence of county government, a municipal way.) "Closing" a road in Massachusetts is insufficient to effect a transfer of land rights.
In Oklahoma a "closed street" and "vacated street" are definitely two different things.?ÿ Streets are often closed to the traveling public with the R/W is maintained for utility purposes.?ÿ Hopefully the wording of the city ordinance originally closing the street was distinct.
In Park County Colorado, they have hundreds of miles of platted, nonbuilt nor monumened roads.?ÿ
Vast areas of plats with no homes even.
Those roads are all still existing, until the formality of vacation etc.?ÿ?ÿ
Weird place it was for sure.
Would you include the strip in a boundary survey based on the description in the deed?
I would not. Having rights via some operation of common law is one thing, having them by operation of an express, written, fully acknowledged, approved, and recorded declaration is quite another. Your client should apply for the city to properly vacate the street - using his common law rights as an inducement.?ÿ
I would show the street as closed per the document reference and unconstructed or disused as appropriate.?ÿ?ÿ
@paden-cash?ÿ ?ÿYes, same way in Florida. You have to read the wording, sometimes the ordinance heading will be different from the fine print. Often a city would pass the Ordinance but not record it in the public records.
It's specific to the actions being taken, but it the courts are in charge of the actual vacation of easements and R/Ws.?ÿ A simple municipal ordinance doesn't work anymore.
A number of years ago the OKC city council "closed and vacated" a public street (NW 22nd.) for the construction of a high-rise.?ÿ The developer owned both sides of the street and the council just merrily passed an ordinance to vacate 22nd. St.?ÿ A twenty story office building was soon built.
A few years later a sharp attorney questioned the way in which the council had acted.?ÿ Those actions really can't happen with the way our state laws are written.?ÿ Action was taken and the courts agreed the city just didn't have the authority to vacate RW that had been dedicated to the public.?ÿ It seemed as though the public still "owned" the property underneath the building.
An actual vacation of dedications to the public requires action by the courts in OK.?ÿ So nowadays when you dedicate easements and RWs within a specific municipality the wording required is NOT a dedication to the public, but a dedication the the municipality as a "municipal corporation".
PS -The sharp attorney I mentioned above actually worked for a title company at the time.?ÿ I've worked with him many times and he is indeed one sharp cookie.
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It doesn't really happen until it is officially recorded with the County.?ÿ A city ordinance is not considered public notice.?ÿ It becomes a public notice when filed in the open records maintained by the county.
@holy-cow?ÿ In Florida, if they give public notice, advertised the meeting, pass the ordinance; it's good. Granted, the public does pay attention to newspapers or drive by the site, but that is considered their notice and the cities action is considered that of the public.?ÿ
The problem comes with the title insurance industry recognizing city actions.?ÿ They do not normally contact the cities, they dig through the county records.?ÿ This has become much more important since the age of the computer and GIS mapping.?ÿ How is the County Appraiser supposed to know a certain alley was vacated?
Maybe surveying needs to start reeling back in with legislation the common and important parts of the process so it's got continuity.
Yes I know. Genies are out of the bottles..?ÿ
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States are too different for me to say outside of the ones I know. There are many closed roads that aren't vacated, two different actions, so here not it would not activate reversionary rights to the surface.?ÿ
In the state of Colorado, the only legal way to vacate a "county road" is by majority vote of the county commissioners. I've been sued twice by the very heirs of the pioneers who petitioned for a county road, because I thought it was still a county road and the heirs didn't want it to be a county road (I was right both times)
@jitterboogie there are a few platted and planned towns like that here in the NJ pines.?ÿ The town of Lakewood, now with a population of 110,000 (and rising rapidly) was platted back in the early 1900's.?ÿ There are still vast areas of unopened roads and undeveloped parcels there, but, oddly enough, somebody had the foresight to monument allot of the roads.
Unconstructed ROWs Arena commen in areas that don't require construcruin for subdivision approval.
An interesting side note (to me anyway). While I was an Ohio County Engineer, I encountered many subdivision plats with the requisite notes dedicating the streets plated as public roads. The county, however, had never accepted a number of them. We would get vacation requests made to the County Commissioners for some of these streets, only to find they had never been accepted. Since the streets had not been accepted, title was still vested in the original landowner, and some of the areas were substantial. I made the remark that the original owner had a time bomb on his hands and most of the time didn't realize that they could receive a substantial tax bill. I think most would simply ignore the bill and let the county try to sell the land on the court house steps.
