Opinion ID: 1748512
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Rights by Private Dedication

Text: None of the parties to this litigation contends for a public dedication of the land for pleasure and recreational purposes. The plats of the three subdivisions put on record, and which are referred to in the deeds to the lot owners, provide: We, Edward C. James [et al.]    do hereby make subdivision of said property for and on behalf of said Eagle Rock Corporation   . Said streets and easements are not dedicated to the public nor intended to be or become available for the public for any purpose. The lot owners contend that the ranch in general, and the area between subdivisions 1 and 2, were dedicated to them, their heirs and assigns. The jury found that there had been a dedication. But the definition of dedication in the charge to the jury made no reference to dedication to the public. Dedication was defined in substance as the voluntary setting aside and devotion of property to a particular use or uses. The definition in the charge did not say to whom the property was dedicated. That brings us to these questions: May there be a dedication to a limited number of persons? May there be a private dedication? We think the answer, at least as applicable here is, No. The authorities are uniformly to this effect, [6] and we so hold. A case bearing some similarity to this is Kraushaar v. Bunny Run Realty Co., 298 Mich. 233, 298 N.W. 514 (1941). There a subdivision was created next to a lake, and it was platted. The plat recited that drives, roads, boulevards and terraces    are hereby dedicated to the use of lot owners of plat   . Instead of the roads and beach area being restricted to the use of the lot owners, the subdividers allowed members of the public to use them upon payment of a fee. The lot owners sued on the ground of dedication to them. The Court held that there was no such thing as dedication to individuals. If there was any dedication, the Court said, it was to the public. [7] See also Burnham v. Davis Islands, Inc., 87 So.2d 97 (Fla.Sup.1956), involving a golf course shown on a plat. There are two Texas cases which need to be distinguished. The first is Evans v. Southside Place Park Ass'n, 154 S.W.2d 914 (Tex.Civ.App.1941, writ refused for want of merit). The subdividers there created an association to maintain a park in Block 8. The deeds to the lot owners expressly provided that Block 8 is reserved as a permanent    playground for the exclusive use and benefit of the property owners of this Addition   . The deeds further provided that, The foregoing terms    shall be covenants running with the soil   . The question was whether the month-to-month tenants of a lot owner should also be entitled to use the park. It was held that they should not, that the use was reserved to lot owners, and the tenants were not owners. The opinion then states: Nor was there any dedication of the park to the public generally, the clear intendment running through all the deeds, the charter, and the by-laws of the Association, unmistakably being to thereby expressly withhold and negative any such implication, but specifically reserving the entire park Block 8 as `a permanent park and playground, for the exclusive use and benefit of the property owners'. By refusing the application for writ of error in that case for want of merit, this Court approved the result reached. The Court of Civil Appeals did not hold that there had been a private dedication. It held that there had not been a public dedication. The basis for the holding was that each lot owner, by express writing in his deed, obtained a covenant running with the land that Block 8 would be reserved as a park for the lot owners. Another case to be distinguished is Hogue v. Glover, 302 S.W.2d 757 (Tex.Civ.App. 1957, writ refused, n. r. e.). The subdivision there centered around Lake Helen, a lake formed by a concrete dam across a creek within the City of Dallas. The plat of the subdivision designated the area of Block B as Lake Helen. Each lot purchaser was told that he would receive a share of stock in a corporation, the Beckley Boating & Fishing Club, Inc. Then the subdivider conveyed the area, Block B, to the corporation. A few years later the dam broke, and the lake again became part of the creek bed. The charter of the corporation was forfeited. Thereafter, a group of people, purporting to represent the defunct corporation, attempted to convey Block B to Fagg who conveyed it to Hogue. The suit was by the lot owners to enjoin Hogue from erecting a house on Lake Helen. The City of Dallas intervened. The injunction was granted. The Court of Civil Appeals affirmed, giving several reasons, at least two of which were sound and would account for this Court's refusal of the writ, No Reversible Error. First, the area was not suitable for residential purposes under the zoning ordinance of the City of Dallas because it was a creek bed. Second, there was no showing that those who purported to represent the defunct corporation and who deeded the property to Fagg, who conveyed to Hogue, had any authority to do so. The City, in the Hogue case, contended that Block B had been dedicated to the public by designating the area as Lake Helen on the plat. The City further claimed the area by virtue of its being within the bed of a stream. The Court held that there had not been a dedication to the public. It did not hold that there had been a private dedication; and the briefs in this Court in that case made no such contention. The Court of Civil Appeals, relying on the Southside Place Park case, discussed just above, held that the so-called dedication [of Block B] was    a covenant running with the land    for the use and benefit of such home owners   . We need not comment on the correctness of this statement, since the case was correctly decided on other grounds. In any event, the case is not authority for the proposition that there was a private dedication to the lot owners. We hold that the lot owners here acquired no rights by private dedication in the 1000-acre ranch or in the area between Subdivisions 1 and 2.