I've been studying the deed of my brother's rural house parcel and the lots he owns in an adjacent rural addition.?ÿ Each one closes nicely after accounting for a couple of copy errors.?ÿ
The addition plat from 1980 shows an expected 33 ft distance, but to the road center instead of the shown section line, indicating those are 13.86 (?) ft apart.?ÿ (I don't know how they measured a road center line to that precision.) To confirm that interpretation, the bearing on the south line of the lots is given as the same as the road center bearing. There is a big nail found, as called for by the plat, not too far from the center of the road and about 33 ft south of the fence post where a rebar lies horizontally as if it was removed to put in the post after the survey.
Do you PLSS surveyors often see road and fence positions overriding a monumented section line on a plat?
The house deed and lots' plat don't fit together, so there are other mysteries as well.
I'm not sure what you mean by "overriding". Just from the info you have given it appears a 33' ROW on the north side of the road was intended. The fact that the ROW is not centered on the section line may?ÿ or may not be unusual or even wrong, depending on how ROW was established for this road. While ROW is centered on section lines in many areas, I don't see anything that says it should be for the plat you are displaying. The section line is certainly not being overridden. It is the section line, the only question is how does the ROW relate to the section line. In this case the relationship appears to be defined by the centerline of the road and is independent of the alignment of the section line.
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Much the same situation as shown here, I suppose. The road centerline doesn't match the section line.
There's got to be a legal somewhere. I've seen something similar before where the road was originally intended to follow the section line but the actual traveled way meandered a bit over the years because of a myriad of reasons, terrain, trees, occupation etc. So the county came in and shot the traveled way and wrote the ROW based on that.?ÿ
One problem doing it that way is the ownership of the ROW stays with the original landowner and he has to pay taxes on it forever, unless the road and ROW are adopted by a public entity, ie. County or State. If the lot lines run to the section line each lot owner is liable for the taxes for the road. Confusing, but I've done a couple of aggregations of road Tracts that are encumbering estates with taxes on road Tracts they were unaware they were still on the books as owning. One almost lost his home because the County put all of his property up for auction for failure to pay the taxes on the road tract.
That's not that uncommon around here, especially if it's a prescriptive right of way.?ÿ The ROW follows the road regardless of section line location.
the ownership of the ROW stays with the original landowner and he has to pay taxes on it forever
In Iowa the assessor shows gross and net-of-road acres for non-subdivision parcels and only taxes the net. In a subdivision the road is dedicated to the public so this is not an issue.
There are exceptions to every standard.?ÿ I have seen cases where the intended ROW was not equal.?ÿ That is, for example, the landowner on the south had 35 feet and the landowner on the north had 25 feet for a total of 60 feet.?ÿ Thus the center of the ROW was five feet south of the section line.?ÿ The proof was in the reading of the road dedication and acceptance in the County Commission Journal from about 1880.?ÿ We have one situation where the ROW is entirely on one side of the section line starting at the half mile line, so there is a jog of 20 feet to the east at that point because the 40-foot was centered on the section line to the south of that point.?ÿ Must have been a landowner who absolutely refused to allow the road to interfere with his property.
Also, I get calls from people who say they own a 9.55-acre tract and want to split it into two tracts of 5.00 and 4.55 acres.?ÿ They are reading their tax notice that says 9.55 acres.?ÿ They actually own a square 10.00-acre tract per an existing survey with half of a 60-foot road along the front, which is a net of 9.55 acres of usable land.?ÿ This leads to educating them about what they actually own.?ÿ The request is then modified to cut the tract in half.
@bill93 Same here if the road goes public. But if it's not built to County standards they won't adopt it here. There are alot of roads that have questionable status. Some are just easements, but some have actual ROWs defined on the Plat that are still in the records as belonging to the original owner. I think they have been paying taxes on them not knowing what they're paying for. Some of them have unknown ownership. My guess they haven't paid taxes on them. If they have a marketable tract next to the ROW files a tax lien on both the tract and the ROW and puts them up for sale. It probably varies among Counties how they handle the delinquent taxes.
The county accepting a road for maintenance purposes doesn't generally affect title. Whether the road is a county maintained road, a unmaintoaned public easement, or a private easement, the effect on the value of the land is similar. Appraisals Are based on the value, not directly on the area. If the area under the road easment is being apprised at the same value as developlable (or agricultural) the landowners need to address that.?ÿ
This isn't unusual at all. Roads are commonly created along property lines, but are often not surveyed till much later. When this happens they don't match.?ÿ
You are right no one can really measure a road center line to the .01'. But for some reason at some point American?ÿ surveyors convinced themselves to report every distance to the .01'.?ÿ