Opinion ID: 1962202
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Right of Way Location

Text: A brief description of the properties involved is requisite to an understanding of this issue. All of the properties involved, in Shelburne and South Burlington, lie westerly of Route U.S. 7 (Shelburne Road) and the railroad right of way formerly the Rutland Railroad. Between the railroad and the individual lots lies the park land owned by the Association, bounded southerly by a public road known as Lozon Road or Pine Haven Drive. The individual lots, eight in number, abut on Lake Champlain, with the southerly lot (Pecor) being bounded southerly by the north line of Lozon Road extended. In northerly progression from Pecor are the lots of Huber, Reikelt (not a party), Thompson, Selby (not a party), Murray, Herge, and Nesti. The right of way in question runs along the easterly boundary of the first seven lots to the Nesti property, which extends from the lake to the railroad, northerly of Herge and the park land. The Nesti deed, last in point of time, was residual in nature in that it conveyed to them (Nesti) all the Lozon property west of the railroad not previously deeded. In its findings and conclusions, the trial court ruled that a garage owned by Thompson was encroaching upon the right of way, and that Nesti owned the right of way. The location of the right of way upon the ground was not found, beyond a determination that it lay immediately easterly of the lots fronting on Lake Champlain. The size of the garage was not determined, nor the extent of its encroachment. Nevertheless, by mandatory injunction removal of the encroachment within ninety days was ordered, despite a request for further determination of the equities involved. It is, in the first instance, quite clear that the mandatory injunction fails to comply with V.R.C.P. 65(d), requiring that it be specific in terms and describe in reasonable detail the acts sought to be restrained. As worded, compliance with it would be impossible to test. Reversal for such noncompliance would be required, were we to uphold the finding of encroachment. So, quite possibly, would remand be required for determination of the respective equities, under the general language set out in Thompson v. Smith, 119 Vt. 488, 509-10, 129 A.2d 638, 651-52 (1957). The paucity of facts found, however, with respect to the right of way location and extent of the encroachment, precludes determinative resolution of this issue. These questions, however, do not determine the result. We are convinced that the general finding of encroachment is not supported by the record, and that the judgment order, insofar as it sets out a mandatory injunction, must be vacated in toto. Encroachment is not shown by the evidence at trial, fairly viewed. We are pointed to a blackboard sketch drawn by Murray, one of the lot owners. Although it shows a rough positioning of Thompson's garage across a right of way line, it is plainly denominated as representing, not the fact, but the claim of Nesti. The only other possible basis for a finding of encroachment, and the one evidently relied upon by the court, is the testimony of a surveyor, Koerner, as to the location on the ground of a pipe evidently set by another surveyor, Hoag, in connection with a plan drawn and recorded several years before the conveyance of the Thompson lot to their predecessors in title. An easterly lot line boundary, passing through this pipe, would bisect the Thompson garage (of unfound dimensions) approximately in the middle. If such a line were in fact Thompson's easterly lot line there would be an encroachment as found. But the pin and line in question cannot be so used, as a matter of law. The Hoag plan is not referred to in the deed to Thompson's predecessor, or anywhere in his chain of title. Neither is the pin. The pin is located 222.07 feet easterly of the top of the lake bank. But the Thompson chain of title describes both his north and south lines as running easterly from the top of the bank a distance of 250 feet. The southerly line is also the northerly line of Reikelt, and is described in his chain as 250 feet. Thompson's northerly line is also the southerly line of Selby, and is described in the Selby chain as 250 feet. All of these deeds precede, in time and recording, the residual conveyance to Nesti. The result is clearly governed by Pareira v. Wehner, 133 Vt. 74, 77, 330 A.2d 84, 86 (1974), wherein we held that an allusion to a prior survey, even if construed as a reference, would not control a metes and bounds description. The facts here furnish even less basis for making the Hoag survey in any way controlling, because the subsequent deeds do not even allude to it, in any manner. Whatever its original purpose, arguably the location of a water line, it never became the basis for the later deeds which here control. The east line of Thompson, therefore, is some 27.93 feet easterly of where the trial court assumed it to be, a discrepancy totally destructive of the finding of encroachment. So much of the judgment order as relates to encroachment by the Thompson garage, and its mandatory removal, must be stricken. Incidental to the claim of encroachment by Thompson, and raised by Thompson's notice of appeal, is the fee ownership of the right of way in question. The trial court found ownership to be in Nesti, and the finding was seasonably challenged by the several lot owners and the Association, by motion to amend. But the issue of fee ownership, as distinct from location, has been neither briefed nor argued here, and is therefore waived. In re Smith, Bell & Hauck Real Estate, Inc., 132 Vt. 295, 318 A.2d 183 (1974).