Without railbanking, the County will need to negotiate a purchase or change of use for the 35 existing easements between CSX and the Ashokan Reservoir. Each easement states that is for "perpetually for all the uses and purposes convenience and necessary for a railroad". This is certainly not impossible, but may take both time and perseverance. EH
BR&P wrote:In New York State, adverse possession does not apply to municipally owned property. Just how that ties into the situation being discussed I'm not able to say, as I have not followed the complete history of the dispute.Just reading back a few posts helps, since the STB came back and said the line was abandoned in 1977, and now reversionary clauses apply to the property, it's like the county never owned it. The railroad may even have a claim to sue for it's lease payments back because of this. The county can't lease the property if it belongs to the adjacent landowners. But, CMR has been using portions of the property for about 25 years. Therefore they may be able to claim the property as squatters. I don't know the specifics of NYS law, but IMHO it's worth looking at, because it would be a great amusing irony if the CMR came out of this owning the portions of the corridor they can claim they were using all this time.
Further, I suspect nothing stops the railroad from also negotiating purchase of segments of the corridor from the adjacent owners.