Opinion ID: 1530103
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Later Events

Text: Yet a third deed and plat were filed by the trustees and the lot owners in 1924, conveniently identified as the Third Ebbs Plat, appended as exhibit No. 3, by which the trustees, the lot owners, and the lessee, the steamboat company, deeded the underlying fee of a portion of South Commercial Wharf to the City of Newport. Importantly, for purposes of this analysis, this plat and conveyance did not deed out the portion of the roadway that connected to the harbor. The Third Ebbs Plat, as indicated by broken lines and a designation of Limit of Right of Way,  cuts off Commercial Wharf at the property leased by the steamboat company. For the first time, the newly named Commercial Wharf was depicted as terminating at a point east of the harbor. Although not part of the conveyance depicted in the Third Ebbs Plat, North Commercial Wharf still ran to the harbor, but as depicted in previous plats, the portion that crossed the steamboat company parcel was undifferentiated. Finally, yet another connector was depicted as the new terminus of Commercial Wharf, connecting it to North Commercial Wharf. With the exception of the new terminus for Commercial Wharf, which was depicted by broken lines, the streets on the Wharf clearly were set forth by solid lines. As noted, Commercial Wharf is not part of this dispute. See note 1, supra. All the remaining lots were conveyed by the trustees, and each deed referenced the First Ebbs Plat and the streets and ways delineated on it. The final lot conveyed, in January 1925, was the steamboat landing at the end of the Wharf. The parties agree that the lease to the steamboat company had expired and the harbor-facing parcel that had been reconfigured in the Third Ebbs Plat was sold to the Progressive Land Company. At this point, the trustees, their work completed, withdrew from the waterfront. The trial justice heard evidence about sales of the Wharf lots by generations of successor grantors; the record discloses that the deeds to these lots still referenced the First Ebbs Plat. Many of these subsequent conveyances were transfers to Realty or its affiliates. As of April 1981, Newport Oil Corporation, an entity affiliated with Realty, had consolidated the property into common ownership. As of June 1986, Realty had acquired all the property that abuts the streets on the Wharf, except the Harbourview property. The parties have stipulated that the public has been using the streets and ways on the Wharf for many years. The evidence also disclosed that the streets on the Wharf have not been taxed by the city  the tax assessor's record reveals that, in 1931, a relatively large portion of the property was removed from the tax rolls as attributable to roads. The tax assessor testified that, in his opinion, this substantial square footage was subtracted from the land area of the Wharf, because it became part of a right of way. The removal of a portion of the property from the tax rolls for streets and roads was not the only act of dominion and control by the city. The evidence disclosed that the city consistently has exerted governmental authority over the streets on the Wharf. The parties have stipulated that the city posted signage on the streets and that, by ordinance adopted in 1952, North Commercial Wharf was designated a one-way street, forming a one-way loop with South Commercial Wharf. In 1962, the city solicitor determined that North Commercial Wharf was a public thoroughfare. He based his opinion on the long-standing public use of the roadway, the fact that the city continuously had repaired and improved the street, and the 1952 municipal ordinance regulating the flow of traffic. The former director of public works, who served from 1954 to 1984, testified that the city maintained the streets on the Wharf, including snow plowing, and that as the director of public works, he always considered the streets to be public ways. In 1982, Newport Oil Corporation, an affiliate related to plaintiff, petitioned the City of Newport for abandonment of Scott's Wharf to construct a commercial building across the roadway. The city denied the petition and refused to abandon the wharf. Despite previously acknowledging that Scott's Wharf was a public road, in 1990, plaintiff filed this action, contending the streets were never offered as public ways, and as owner of the lots that abut the rights of way, it now owned the fee as a result of merger.