Opinion ID: 770420
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 7

Heading: The cross-appeal--Hassell's interest

Text: 55 It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that the costs of this litigation are being compounded out of all proportion to the stakes involved. Even more disturbing, nearly four years after the complaint in this casewas filed, the county defendants appear to misapprehend the role of Mary Nave's neighbor in this dispute. In their opening brief, the county defendants make much of the fact that when Shirley Montgomery asked the Carter County Highway Committee to take her mother's driveway off the county's list of roads, she did not explain . . . that any other person [i.e., Hassell] made use of the driveway. 56 But the question of whether any other person used the driveway appears to have nothing to do with the question of whether the Naves own it or Carter County owns it. Hassell may indeed have a dispute with the Naves over whether she has the right to use the driveway, but that is a very different dispute than the one the county defendants have created. 57 The answer to whether or not Carter County owns the driveway should be found in its archives. If Carter County has no record of Queen Nave Road existing before it first appeared on the county's list of roads in 1995, and there is no record of the driveway's sale, grant, or dedication to the county, then we are at a loss to understand why the absence of documentation should not be conclusive. Why the county defendants thought that they needed to hear from Hassell in order to determine whether Carter County owns the driveway is unclear. Regardless of the outcome of any dispute between Hassell and the Naves over the use of the driveway, it would not follow that the Naves would have to tolerate the use of their driveway by other uninvited members of the general public, and it certainly would not follow that the driveway is the county's property.