Irrevocable License case

> Apparently California has a settled equitable doctrine based in Estoppel wherein a user of the land of another may be able to prove the existence of an Irrevocable License to continue the use although permission has been withdrawn...

Yes, the basic equitable principle is avoidance of waste, I'd say. One party spent large sums of money and significant effort installing and maintaining landscape plants along a driveway easement. The owner of the land made no timely objection and, later, insisted that it all be removed, thus destroying a value that both land owners agreed was significant.

One detail of the case that I'm not clear on is this:

>Appellants next claim the court erred in granting respondents an irrevocable license “to maintain and improve landscaping, irrigation, and lighting within the 30’ wide and 150’ long easement.” Appellants argue the irrevocable license should have been “strictly limited to the specific portions of the easement which had in the past been used by [r]espondents for gardening and landscaping.” Again, the trial court is better equipped than we are to fashion equitable relief and we afford it considerable discretion.

I'm not seeing how any equity could arise without actual use and installation of substantial improvements.

As I began to read this I was thinking the appealing party's counsel was blowing wind. As I read on, I thought they made an exhaustive (if not valiant) attempt for an appeal, hopeless but exhaustive.

Sounds as if they used the whole of it as their own (even if small parts were not utilized), and the court would have granted title to all of it. But the facts don't fit nicely into any of the change of title laws, so they resort to including the whole in the license. I wonder what use (if any) the title holders can make of it at this point. Can they give other easements over it? Do they now pay higher taxes on a substantially improved property that they are barred from entering?

I guess it doesn't matter from an equitable standpoint because it is the situation they bought into.

You have to wonder what it really was that made him mad - probably not the driveway.

I wonder what right he had to begin removing the improvements. As long as the improvements were within the easement (expressly permitted or not) and not so permanent as to hinder utility maintenance, there could be no case for ejectment.