alligator2600
Junior Member
What is the name of your state? Florida
I have an easement on a strip of privately owned land that allows me and about 12 other homeowners to ingress and egress by either foot or vehicle. The land runs in front of all of our homes and parallels a canal on the other side of the road easement. In other words, houses on one side of the road easement and canal on the other. The land/ditch that contains the water is owned by the grantor of the road easement. The water and fish are owned by the state. The owner of the land lives nowhere on the road or easement.
Two of us homeowners like to stand on the easement and fish in the canal. Our fishing activity in no way effects traffic. Suddenly this weekend, the landowner put "Posted--no fishing, etc." signs in front of my house and the other fishing neighbor's house but no other house. I'm about 250 yards from the other neighbor's sign. The posted signs have the owners name on them but no contact information. I've been told he is supposed to put his address on them and the signs need to be no more than 150 feet apart the entire length of the canal to be enforceable. Since they are so far apart we are apparently able to stand in front of other homes and fish!
It has also been suggested that since homeowners have been allowed to fish from the easement for 20-30 years (and us for the last few years) that there is a presumptive access for homeowners to use the easement for fishing that cannot be revoked by the land owner.
I fear that he has the right to do this and keep me from standing on the easement and fishing in public waters. What do you think?
One small issue--the easement document explicitly relieves the owner of all maintenance responsibilites but is silent regarding who is responsible. Does his abrogation of responsibility automatically transfer the burden onto the grantees of the easement? The problem is that there are trees that overhang the easement that have done damage to equipment on the top of my motorhome. The grantor refuses to trim the trees since he isn't responsible for maintenance BUT he has denied me the right to trim the trees since they are "his trees."
Bob
I have an easement on a strip of privately owned land that allows me and about 12 other homeowners to ingress and egress by either foot or vehicle. The land runs in front of all of our homes and parallels a canal on the other side of the road easement. In other words, houses on one side of the road easement and canal on the other. The land/ditch that contains the water is owned by the grantor of the road easement. The water and fish are owned by the state. The owner of the land lives nowhere on the road or easement.
Two of us homeowners like to stand on the easement and fish in the canal. Our fishing activity in no way effects traffic. Suddenly this weekend, the landowner put "Posted--no fishing, etc." signs in front of my house and the other fishing neighbor's house but no other house. I'm about 250 yards from the other neighbor's sign. The posted signs have the owners name on them but no contact information. I've been told he is supposed to put his address on them and the signs need to be no more than 150 feet apart the entire length of the canal to be enforceable. Since they are so far apart we are apparently able to stand in front of other homes and fish!
It has also been suggested that since homeowners have been allowed to fish from the easement for 20-30 years (and us for the last few years) that there is a presumptive access for homeowners to use the easement for fishing that cannot be revoked by the land owner.
I fear that he has the right to do this and keep me from standing on the easement and fishing in public waters. What do you think?
One small issue--the easement document explicitly relieves the owner of all maintenance responsibilites but is silent regarding who is responsible. Does his abrogation of responsibility automatically transfer the burden onto the grantees of the easement? The problem is that there are trees that overhang the easement that have done damage to equipment on the top of my motorhome. The grantor refuses to trim the trees since he isn't responsible for maintenance BUT he has denied me the right to trim the trees since they are "his trees."
Bob
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