Walters v. Servidio

Citations

• 227 Conn. App. 1

Syllabus

The plaintiffs and the defendants owned real property on Road A, which intersects with Road B in two locations. The northern intersection was north of the defendants' properties and south of the plaintiffs' properties and was known as the ''Y right of way.'' The only access to the southern intersection was obtained by traveling over an area between the defen- dants' properties (disputed area), which was rocky, wooded, and unpaved. The Y right of way, which provided the plaintiffs with access to Road B, was much closer to the plaintiffs' properties than the southern intersection. In 1908, before the Y right of way existed, the original subdivision map for the area was recorded on the land records. In 1958, the northern part of the subdivision was resubdivided into larger lots, some of which would later become the plaintiffs' properties, and the resubdivision map recorded on the land records shows the Y right of way. When the defendants purchased their property on Road A, the paving in front of their house that ran from the northern part of the disputed area to the Y right of way was not a road but a driveway nine feet in width, and there was no paving or other physical manifestation of a road in the disputed area. Since the defendants purchased the property on Road A in 1987, with the exception of a short period of time during a sewer project in late 2003 and early 2004, during which time the defendants granted to the town of Greenwich an easement for sewer installation, the disputed area had not been passable to traffic and the defendants had not observed anyone travel through the disputed area for any purpose, including to access the southern intersection. The plaintiffs filed on the town's land records affidavits of fact against the defendants' properties on Road A and Road B that falsely claimed an easement over the disputed area. The plaintiffs thereafter commenced the present action, seeking, inter alia, a declaratory judgment that they had an express or implie