Where do I find California law on Private Road closing by force (roadblock)

[Bernard]

Where do I find the law on private road closure rules in California?

There is a half-mile long two-car-wide private road that is signed with
only a single sign at the entrance saying it's a private road.

I called the county and they said it is not a public road.

My buddies and I use the private road every weekend to ride our mountain
bikes down to a path that is on private property and then goes to public
property after about a mile. Everyone has been doing this for years.

Nobody ever stopped us before, but last week the owner blocked the road and
said that only residents, their guests, and their utilities could travel
down the road.

We decided to ride right by him.

He basically stopped us by force, saying that he wanted our identification
and we refused to give it to him and he ordered us off the road.

This road, to my knowledge, has *NEVER* been closed before. The previous
owners let us ride down it, or, more accurately, nobody ever stopped us
before.

Where do I find the California law on whether they can close the road since
they never closed it before. I'm not disputing that it's private property,
but I am wondering if they have any legal basis to stop us since they never
stopped us before.

I noticed a car went through while we were arguing but I didn't know the
circumstances.

Can the owner just stop bicyclists?
Can the owner stop anyone if he hasn't done so before?

Where do I find the law on private road closure rules in California?

[Stuart O. Bronstein]

Bernard <alexandr...@numericable.fr> wrote:

> Where do I find the law on private road closure rules in
> California?

The California Vehicle Code is here:

http://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codesTOCSelected.xhtml?
tocCode=VEH&tocTitle=+Vehicle+Code+-+VEH

also known as http://tinyurl.com/jc239k4

> There is a half-mile long two-car-wide private road that is
> signed with only a single sign at the entrance saying it's a
> private road.

A single sign is all they need.

> I called the county and they said it is not a public road.
>
> My buddies and I use the private road every weekend to ride our
> mountain bikes down to a path that is on private property and
> then goes to public property after about a mile. Everyone has
> been doing this for years.

For how many years exactly? Can you prove it? If the public has
been using it without being stopped for more than five years, you
could have prescriptive rights.

> Nobody ever stopped us before, but last week the owner blocked
> the road and said that only residents, their guests, and their
> utilities could travel down the road.
>
> We decided to ride right by him.
>
> He basically stopped us by force, saying that he wanted our
> identification and we refused to give it to him and he ordered
> us off the road.
>
> This road, to my knowledge, has *NEVER* been closed before. The
> previous owners let us ride down it, or, more accurately, nobody
> ever stopped us before.
>
> Where do I find the California law on whether they can close the
> road since they never closed it before. I'm not disputing that
> it's private property, but I am wondering if they have any legal
> basis to stop us since they never stopped us before.

That kind of law is probably in cases, not statutes or regulations.

But the bottom line is, even if you have the right to use the road
(which you may), you won't get anywhere unless you go to court and
sue to get the right declared by a judge. In the mean time the owner
can call the police and have you physically removed.

So you should talk to a lawyer in person, who can get the necessary
information and get to the bottom of what rights you may or may not
have.

Google the county bar association lawyer referral service in your
area, and they will give you the names of lawyers who may be able to
help you. The lawyers will give you a free 30 minute consultation,
but they will collect a fee of $25 to $50 that will go to the bar
association.

Good luck.

--
Stu
http://DownToEarthLawyer.com
https://www.etsy.com/shop/studiobethdesigns

[John Levine]

In article <nmugte$1vv9$1...@gioia.aioe.org>,

Bernard <alexandr...@numericable.fr> wrote:
>Where do I find the law on private road closure rules in California?

Look up "adverse possession" and "prescriptive easement." If people
have been using property without formal permission for long enough,
they eventually get a legal right to use it. Long enough varies from
place to place but ten years is typical.

In the New Jersey town where I grew up, we used a shortcut through the
yard of one of our neighbors and the yard of the house behind it to
get to school. At one point the new owner of the house behind put up
a fence to close the path, so a group of neighbors sued. I provided
an affidavit saying I'd been using the path since I was in high school
30 years before. Our group won, and got a legal easement which it
deeded to the town.

[McGyver]

Bernard pretended :

> Where do I find the law on private road closure rules in California?
>
> There is a half-mile long two-car-wide private road that is signed with
> only a single sign at the entrance saying it's a private road.
>
> I called the county and they said it is not a public road.
>
> My buddies and I use the private road every weekend to ride our mountain
> bikes down to a path that is on private property and then goes to public
> property after about a mile. Everyone has been doing this for years.
>

<snip>

> Where do I find the law on private road closure rules in California?

This link leads to an article about the law of prescriptive easements:
http://www.troutmansanders.com/files/upload/Prescriptive%20Easements%20in%20California.pdf
The article contains references to law sources. I am not qualified to
vouch for the accuracy of the article.

I am not qualified in this field of law, so the following are an
amateur’s suggestions. After you have read the article, I suggest you
investigate the ownership of the land and the existence of easements.
Here are the steps:

1. Go to The county recorder and find out who owns the land. If
multiple owners own the land, get all of their names and lot
descriptions. Use the county recorder's map to confirm that you found
all of the owners on both sides. If there are gaps in your research,
that's not a problem if you have the names of the owners of both sides
of the road at the end where it connects to a public road.

2. Confirm that the owners are humans. If there are any corporations,
partnerships, trusts, LLC's, etc., confirm that they are owned by
humans or entities other than government agencies. The county recorder
can't help with that part. The state secretary of state website will be
of some help regarding corporations and LLC's.

3. Check the records for easements. A public road is either owned by a
government agency or there is a recorded easement in favor of a
government agency.

4. If you conclude that none of the land is owned by the U.S.
Government, State of California, the county, any city, or any agency of
any government agency and that there is no recorded easement creating
rights in favor of a government agency, then the road is a private
road. In that case, the owners have the right to block it and that's
what they should do, every year, to prevent constant use from creating
a prescriptive easement.

If you conclude that the road is a public road, there are several ways
to make sure that your right to use the road is not interfered with.
The easiest way, which might or might not work, is to tell the
government agency that owns the property or the easement that some
people are blocking the public road and that you are going to drive
onto that road tomorrow afternoon and that it would be nice if a
government person showed up with a cop.

If your research proves that the road is privately owned and that no
government agency has an easement, the owners have the right to block
the road unless someone can establish that a prescriptive easement has
been created by long term use of the road. A prescriptive easement can
be proved in court and the results can be used to insure that the road
is never blocked by private landowners. How to do that is the subject
of another question.

This answer must not be relied on as legal advice for the reasons
posted here: http://mcgyverdisclaimer.blogspot.com . And I am not your
attorney.

McGyver

[Sivagumar]

On Sat, 23 Jul 2016 01:22:55 +0000 (UTC), Bernard wrote:

> Where do I find the law on private road closure rules in California?

While California is one of the strangest states in that it classifies
trespassing to be either an infraction, a misdemeanor, or even a felony, in
reality, it's almost impossible to get arrested for trespassing in the
state of California.

Look at property owner legal requirements here just by way of example:
http://www.indiopd.org/pdf/Trespassing_Requirements.pdf

Specifically look at California Penal Code 602 L and N, which basically say
the signs must exist almost everywhere and in number and that you have to
literally *interfere* with the homeowner or *ignore* their directives to
get off.

Basically if the state-mandated signage isn't there, and if the homeowner
doesn't communicate *monthly* in writing with the local police department,
you can effectively loiter on a bench in their front yard for as long as
you like.

Just don't go inside!

[Barry Gold]

On 7/22/2016 6:22 PM, Bernard wrote:
> Where do I find the law on private road closure rules in California?

I'm not sure about road closure rules, but... if you can prove that the
general public has been using that road for at least 20 years and the
owners have never actually prevented them (by installing gates, or by
having somebody there to stop traffic, etc.), then you can probably go
to court for a prescriptive easement.

See a lawyer who specializes in Real Estate law. Ask your lawyer to
recommend somebody. If you don't have a personal lawyer, ask your
relatives, friends, and coworkers for the names of their lawyers, then
phone and ask for the referral.


--
I do so have a memory. It's backed up on DVD... somewhere...

[Micky]

On Sat, 23 Jul 2016 01:22:55 +0000 (UTC), Bernard

<alexandr...@numericable.fr> wrote:

>Where do I find the law on private road closure rules in California?
>
>There is a half-mile long two-car-wide private road that is signed with
>only a single sign at the entrance saying it's a private road.
>
>I called the county and they said it is not a public road.
>
>My buddies and I use the private road every weekend to ride our mountain
>bikes down to a path that is on private property and then goes to public
>property after about a mile. Everyone has been doing this for years.
>
>Nobody ever stopped us before, but last week the owner blocked the road and
>said that only residents, their guests, and their utilities could travel
>down the road.
>
>We decided to ride right by him.
>
>He basically stopped us by force, saying that he wanted our identification
>and we refused to give it to him and he ordered us off the road.
>
>This road, to my knowledge, has *NEVER* been closed before. The previous
>owners let us ride down it, or, more accurately, nobody ever stopped us
>before.

This is certainly a distressing story, but you omit that you used foul
language in front of the homeowner's children; that you called the
police after you left them and then used foul language with the
police.

More importantly, you omit that you told the police that he pushed you
off your bicycle when he didn't touch you at all.

My sympathy for you, and by extension your friends, is gone.

All I have left is my general inclination for open roads.

I could make this post more specifically statute-related, and provide
some legal advice, and I did I think of some of what the othes said
and I coudl repeat it.

But I think pre-trial negotiations are fairly called part of the legal
world.

And I hope the moderator will excuse me for not being more
statute-oriented.

I remind the OP that all the failures on his part that I list above
will end up coming up at any dealings with the police, meeting,
hearing, or court procedure that follows. Even if, formally, they
might be irrelevant in court, they will still be known by most in all
these forums .

You're probably young, so you may not know that you catch more bees
with honey than with vinegar.

Before he didn't want bicyclists on his road. Now he dislikes YOU,
and he's doubled down on his original reasons.

If you want to resolve this, you should show up at his house with a
quite nice present for each of his children who were present when you
used the foul language. The more of you there was in the group, the
nicer the present should be, and since children shouldn't get too much
in the way of presents, once you get to that point, the rest of what
you spend should go to the owner himself. Something for his lawn or
garden would be nice, something maybe he doesn't already have, like a
timer for the garden hose/sprinklers, a weather vane (though one needs
a spot to put that). If his lot is big and he has no sprinkler
system and there is still enough water in California to water the
grass, one of those sprinklers that roll slowly along the hose. All
of those are affordable buy not chintzy.

Then you can ask nicely for his permission, and at the same time you
can ask if he has any special objections and whatever they are, I'm
sure you can reassure him and live up to that reassurance.

I'm sure you can get his permission, and if as you speculated he was
willing to exclude only bicylces, then he will also be able to exclude
only OTHER bicycles and not you. But you will have to be continuously
nice, not foul. You are only in earshot of them for a minute or two;
it should not be hard.

How many other bikers he has to deal with is another story.

Is he a new owner, or has he permitted it for years and something
happened to make him change his tolerance. Did you ask why he had
changed his attitude? Maybe there is something you can do to reliieve
his problem. Have you seen vandalism and done nothing about it? You
called the police because of him, but did you see vandalism, not take
a picture of the perps, not call the police then.

Have you yourselves ridden on wet ground, perhaps where the road meets
the trail.

Has anyone of the trespassers done anything that a person with a home
would not like?

There is land just outside my fence that I and my n'bor own, a
strip meant for access to the back of our houses, and since I've been
here each day, about 20 JHS students walk one way and 20 HS students
walk the other way in the morning, and back again in the afternoon.

For years I had no objection until one or two of them on bicycles
would ride on rain-soaked ground and make ruts in the ground and kill
the grass. Then I started acting something like the guy you met.


So you can try what I suggest, which if done without a sneer one one's
face, if done in the spirit I'm recommending, has a 90% chance of
working, and making the road's use more likely even for bicyclists you
dont' know.

Or if you want, you can spend lots of time researching the law,
talking to police and city officials, and end up losing anyhow. For
yourself and every bicyclist to follow, until this guy dies or moves.

And time is of the essence, because if they spend substantial money,
or any money, on methods to keep you out, or on legal counsel to
discuss it, after that, they will be much less willing to compromise.

[Bernard]

On Mon, 25 Jul 2016 04:33:50 -0700, McGyver wrote:

> 1. Go to The county recorder and find out who owns the land. If
> multiple owners own the land, get all of their names and lot
> descriptions. Use the county recorder's map to confirm that you found
> all of the owners on both sides. If there are gaps in your research,
> that's not a problem if you have the names of the owners of both sides
> of the road at the end where it connects to a public road.

We've already done this, and we have spoken to the owners' representative
who is one of the homeowners at the connection to the public road.

The county agrees it's a private road with no public access.
The owners and bikers all agree it is signed private.

But we still want to be able to pass so we're looking at our options.

> 2. Confirm that the owners are humans. If there are any corporations,
> partnerships, trusts, LLC's, etc., confirm that they are owned by
> humans or entities other than government agencies. The county recorder
> can't help with that part. The state secretary of state website will be
> of some help regarding corporations and LLC's.

They're all humans. They're actually nice people.
They are worried about lawsuits and theft and privacy and safety, just like
anyone else would be.

> 3. Check the records for easements. A public road is either owned by a
> government agency or there is a recorded easement in favor of a
> government agency.

It's a private road, no public access.
Nobody disagrees with that.

> 4. If you conclude that none of the land is owned by the U.S.
> Government, State of California, the county, any city, or any agency of
> any government agency and that there is no recorded easement creating
> rights in favor of a government agency, then the road is a private
> road. In that case, the owners have the right to block it and that's
> what they should do, every year, to prevent constant use from creating
> a prescriptive easement.

You can't get a prescriptive easement on government land in the state of
California. Some of the land *is* owned by the state, about 3 miles away,
where the trail starts, but they have a sign saying "not a trail".

> If you conclude that the road is a public road, there are several ways
> to make sure that your right to use the road is not interfered with.
> The easiest way, which might or might not work, is to tell the
> government agency that owns the property or the easement that some
> people are blocking the public road and that you are going to drive
> onto that road tomorrow afternoon and that it would be nice if a
> government person showed up with a cop.

The cops were called by one group of bikers.
The cops told them to leave.
The cops also told the owners to put up more signs saying Penal Code 602 to
make it easier for the cops to arrest people.

> If your research proves that the road is privately owned and that no
> government agency has an easement, the owners have the right to block
> the road unless someone can establish that a prescriptive easement has
> been created by long term use of the road. A prescriptive easement can
> be proved in court and the results can be used to insure that the road
> is never blocked by private landowners. How to do that is the subject
> of another question.

We will try to take the owners land by the force of a prescriptive
easement, especially as the owner is thinking of charging us $5 to travel
on his road.

We might do whatever is cheaper since it's hard to charge people and it's
hard for us to take his land from him - but we will try something.

> This answer must not be relied on as legal advice for the reasons
> posted here: http://mcgyverdisclaimer.blogspot.com . And I am not your
> attorney.

We spoke with a lawyer who said it will cost us about 10 grand to win a
prescriptive easement battle.

[Bernard]

On Wed, 27 Jul 2016 00:05:19 -0700, Barry Gold wrote:

> I'm not sure about road closure rules, but... if you can prove that the
> general public has been using that road for at least 20 years and the
> owners have never actually prevented them (by installing gates, or by
> having somebody there to stop traffic, etc.), then you can probably go
> to court for a prescriptive easement.
>
> See a lawyer who specializes in Real Estate law. Ask your lawyer to
> recommend somebody. If you don't have a personal lawyer, ask your
> relatives, friends, and coworkers for the names of their lawyers, then
> phone and ask for the referral.

There are gates.
And one sign.
We just ignore the sign and go around the gates.
The lawyers said that adverse possession is impossible.
But that prescriptive easements would cost about 10 grand.

[Bernard]

On Mon, 25 Jul 2016 09:53:32 +0000 (UTC), John Levine wrote:

> Look up "adverse possession" and "prescriptive easement." If people
> have been using property without formal permission for long enough,
> they eventually get a legal right to use it. Long enough varies from
> place to place but ten years is typical.

Adverse possession can't possibly apply, because in California, it has to
be continuous, and, for shorter periods than 20 years, it has to have had
the property taxes paid on it.

Prescriptive easements are still on the table though.

> In the New Jersey town where I grew up, we used a shortcut through the
> yard of one of our neighbors and the yard of the house behind it to
> get to school. At one point the new owner of the house behind put up
> a fence to close the path, so a group of neighbors sued. I provided
> an affidavit saying I'd been using the path since I was in high school
> 30 years before. Our group won, and got a legal easement which it
> deeded to the town.

We spoke to the property owner who said he'd give us permission at $5 per
transit, so we're considering that.

We figure it will cost him more to collect the money than it will be worth
to him, so, that's why we'll consider that.

[Stuart Bronstein]

Barry Gold <Barry...@ca.rr.com> wrote:

> I'm not sure about road closure rules, but... if you can prove
> that the general public has been using that road for at least 20
> years and the owners have never actually prevented them (by
> installing gates, or by having somebody there to stop traffic,
> etc.), then you can probably go to court for a prescriptive
> easement.

In California it's only five years.

[Bernard]

On Tue, 26 Jul 2016 00:10:51 -0400, Micky wrote:

> This is certainly a distressing story, but you omit that you used foul
> language in front of the homeowner's children; that you called the
> police after you left them and then used foul language with the
> police.

That wasn't me but that did happen to others.
How do you know that?

> More importantly, you omit that you told the police that he pushed you
> off your bicycle when he didn't touch you at all.

I don't know about that though.
But I don't doubt it, knowing the fool who did that.

> Before he didn't want bicyclists on his road. Now he dislikes YOU,
> and he's doubled down on his original reasons.

The owners are actually OK people.
They just want their privacy.
And we want their road.

The problem is that the owner wants money from us.
And we basically want it for free.

The lawyer said it would cost us 10 grand to get a prescriptive easement.
So we might agree to be charged $5 for traveling and hoping to slip by.

[Micky]

On Sat, 23 Jul 2016 01:22:55 +0000 (UTC), Bernard
<alexandr...@numericable.fr> wrote

>Where do I find the law on private road closure rules in California?
>
>There is a half-mile long two-car-wide private road that is signed with
>only a single sign at the entrance saying it's a private road.
>
>I called the county and they said it is not a public road.
>
>My buddies and I use the private road every weekend to ride our mountain
>bikes down to a path that is on private property and then goes to public
>property after about a mile. Everyone has been doing this for years.
>
>Nobody ever stopped us before, but last week the owner blocked the road and
>said that only residents, their guests, and their utilities could travel
>down the road.
>
>We decided to ride right by him.
>
>He basically stopped us by force, saying that he wanted our identification
>and we refused to give it to him and he ordered us off the road.
>
>This road, to my knowledge, has *NEVER* been closed before. The previous
>owners let us ride down it, or, more accurately, nobody ever stopped us
>before.

This theme is echoed often on the Rawhide (the TV show you yungens
might not have seen). The ranchers and even farmers are always
closing off land to the cattle drive. But Gil Favor always knows the
land is supposed to be open. Sometimes he seems to have checked
county or state records.

Unfortunately this is all Texas, Kansas, and Indian Territory in
between. This probably accounts for all the episodes where the
Indians are causing trouble usually, or help once in a while. Strange
I never thought about that before. Now it's called Oklahoma after we
stole that from them too, after ceding it to them. I think this is
where the term Indian giver comes from. But none of those places
are California. I hope the moderator doesn't quash this post because
of that. We get so few posts these day, not that I'm complaining.

But here's some legal stuff:

>Where do I find the California law on whether they can close the road since
>they never closed it before. I'm not disputing that it's private property,
>but I am wondering if they have any legal basis to stop us since they never
>stopped us before.

The public may have gained rights through adverse possession. I
don't know what the period of time that's needed for that in Cal. I
don't know the last time the road was blocked off, and I don't know if
the owner has any evidence it was ever blocked off before.

In NYC and elsewhere, if you check out the plazas surrounding
skyscrapers, and others places too I'm sure, there will be a little
brass insert showing the boundary, or the corner of the boundary, and
once a year, the owner will close off his plaza to the public for a
day to reassert his ownership. (NYC law `used to require higher
floors to be smaller, to let in light and air I think. Perhaps when
building techniques changed, they wanted to build straight up, so then
the law required plazas around tall buildings, also to let in light
and air. The "canyons of Wall Street" were no longer in favor. So
there are plazas all over the place which is good, and many addresses
like 2 Standard Oil Plaza, which is bad because no one knows where it
is.