A Vermont judge has ruled that towns have the authority to maintain public trails on private property.
The issue stems from a lawsuit filed last fall in Tunbridge, Vermont, where a landowner attempted to crack down on bikes using a legal trail running through his land.
Windsor County Superior Court Judge Dickson Corbett cited precedents from the 1840s and even the late 1700s to assert that Vermont towns have the authority to maintain trails with a public easement.
Corbett said the whole point of a public easement is to enable the public to travel over the easement without having to bargain with the landowner for permission.
“It would defeat the purpose of a public easement to locate the ‘right to control’ the easement not with the town but rather with the underlying landowner,” wrote Corbett.
The landowner has stated he plans to appeal.
