Lucier v. United States
| Decision Date | 01 June 2018 |
| Docket Number | No. 16-865L,No. 16-893L,16-865L,16-893L |
| Parties | ANDREW S. LUCIER, et al., THOMAS E. BEATTIE, et al., Plaintiffs, v. UNITED STATES, Defendant. |
| Court | U.S. Claims Court |
Cross-Motion for Partial Summary Judgment; Fifth Amendment Taking; Rails to Trails; Prescriptive Easement; Fee Simple Interest; Easement; Deed Interpretation; Plat Interpretation
John R. Sears, Baker Sterchi Cowden and Rice, LLC, St. Louis, MO, for plaintiffs in Lucier et al. v. United States, Case No. 16-865L. Of counsel was Jacqueline D. Gebhardt, Baker Sterchi Cowden and Rice, LLC, St. Louis, MO.
Thomas S. Stewart, Stewart, Wald & McCulley, LLC, St. Louis, MO, for plaintiffs in Beattie v. United States, Case No. 16-893L. Of counsel were Steven M. Wald and Michael J. Smith, Stewart, Wald & McCulley, LLC, St. Louis, MO, and Elizabeth G. McCulley, Stewart, Wald & McCulley, LLC, Kansas City, MO.
Sarah Izfar, Trial Attorney, Natural Resources Section, Environmental and Natural Resources Division, United States Department of Justice, Washington, D.C., for defendant. With her was Jeffrey H. Wood, Acting Assistant Attorney General, Environment and Natural Resources Division.
In the above-captioned cases, plaintiffs are landowners in Thurston County, Washington, who allege that the United States government effected takings of their reversionary property interests through the operation of the National Trails System Act, 16 U.S.C. § 1241 et eq. (2012) (the Trails Act). Plaintiffs allege a taking occurred when the United States Surface Transportation Board (STB) issued a Notice of Interim Trail Use (NITU) related to a railroad corridor abutting plaintiffs' property that prevented plaintiffs' state-law property rights from reverting to and vesting in plaintiffs. As a result of the government's alleged taking of plaintiffs' reversionary property interests, plaintiffs assert they are entitled to just compensation under the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution.
Although the plaintiffs in both cases assert claims relating to the same railroad corridor in the State of Washington, plaintiffs filed their takings claims in the United States Court of Federal Claims separately and are represented by two separate counsels of record. The two cases are captioned as Andrew S. Lucier, et al. v. United States, No. 16-865 (Lucier),1 and Thomas E. Beattie, et al. v. United States, No. 16-893 (Beattie).2 On January 11, 2017, the court, finding the factual and legal issues in the two cases to be substantially similar, consolidated the above-captioned cases for case management purposes.
The BNSF Railway Company (BNSF) previously operated a railroad corridor that extended, in relevant part, approximately 1.43 miles through Belmore, Thurston County, Washington. Plaintiffs are landowners in Thurston County, Washington.
As discussed in greater detail below, the railroad corridor appears to have been constructed during the 1890s. In 1970, the Northern Pacific Railway Company merged with the Great Northern Railway Company and the Chicago Burlington and Quincy Railroad Company and became the Burlington Northern Railroad Company. In 1996, the Burlington Northern Railroad Company merged with the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway Company to become the Burlington Northern and Santa Fe Railway Company. In 2005, the Burlington Northern and Santa Fe Railway Company was renamed as the BNSF Railway Company, which remains BNSF's current name today.
On April 21, 2016, BNSF filed a Notice of Exemption with the STB. BNSF's Notice of Exemption proposed to consummate abandonment of a railroad line between milepost 14.57 and milepost 16.0 in Thurston County, Washington (the railroad corridor) within fifty days. According to BNSF's Notice of Exemption, "[n]o local or overhead freight rail traffichas traveled over the Line since prior to 2005." By letter dated May 24, 2016, Thurston County Public Works (Thurston County) filed a request for a public use condition and a request for interim trail use with the STB. The Thurston County May 24, 2016 request indicated that it was willing to assume financial responsibility for the portion of the railroad corridor that BNSF was seeking to abandon in Thurston County. On June 2, 2016, BNSF filed a response to Thurston County's May 24, 2016 request, which stated that BNSF did not object to the issuance of a NITU.
On July 19, 2016, the STB issued a NITU that permitted BNSF and Thurston County to negotiate a trail use agreement for the railroad corridor. The STB initially granted BNSF and Thurston County a 180-day period from the issuance of the NITU to negotiate a trail use agreement, which concluded on January 16, 2017. By an electronic filing, dated January 25, 2017, BNSF informed the STB that, on January 19, 2017, BNSF and Thurston County had reached an agreement to railbank the railroad corridor.
The agreement entered into by BNSF and Thurston County on January 19, 2017, was titled "RAILBANKING AND MARKET SALE CONTRACT" (the Agreement). (capitalization in original). Under the Agreement, BNSF agreed to convey, via quitclaim deed, "all of BNSF's right, title and interest" in the railroad corridor to Thurston County in exchange for $346,500.00. BNSF also reserved "the right to reactivate and restore rail service on the [railroad corridor] pursuant to the National Trails System Act, as amended . . . ." Thurston County agreed not to "impair future restoration of rail service" and to allow reactivation of rail service on the railroad corridor at any time. On February 22, 2017, BNSF and Thurston County executed a quitclaim deed conveying the railroad corridor to Thurston County. The February 22, 2017 quitclaim deed stated that the quitclaim deed was subject "to the terms of that certain Railbanking and Market Sale Contract between BNSF and Grantee [Thurston County], dated January 19, 2017" and included BNSF's right to reactivate and restore rail service on the railroad corridor pursuant to the Trails Act.
Plaintiffs and defendant agree that BNSF held an easement for railroad purposes in the railroad corridor. In both of the above-captioned cases, however, the parties dispute whether recreational trail use exceeded the scope of BNSF's easement in the railroad corridor, and whether plaintiffs had an interest in the land underlying the railroad corridor.3
According to filings submitted by plaintiffs to this court, the Northern Pacific Railway Company, BNSF's predecessor-in-interest, filed a map and valuation schedulewith the Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) in 1917, which indicated the manner in which the Northern Pacific Railway Company obtained its interest in the railroad corridor. The ICC valuation map indicates that the Northern Pacific Railway Company obtained its interest in the pertinent portion of the railroad corridor at issue in the above-captioned cases partially through four deeds, each of which is titled as a "Right Of Way Deed," and partially through "[a]dverse possession."
The four right of way deeds were individually entered into by the Tacoma Olympia and Grays Harbor Railroad Company and E. W. Austin and D. L. Austin (Austin deed), L. W. Mann and Laura E. Mann (Mann deed), A. A. Hunter and Sarah E. Hunter (Hunter deed), and P. P. Carroll and Sarah J. T. Carroll (Carroll deed), respectively, in 1890.4 According to the ICC valuation map, the "Tacoma Olympia and Grays Harbor Railroad Company conveyed its entire property to the United Railroads of Washington by deed on Aug. 5, 1890," and "[t]he United Railroads of Washington conveyed their entire property to Northern Pacific Railway Company by deed dated Feb. 14, 1898 . . . ." The Austin deed, Mann deed, Hunter deed, and Carroll deed conveyed land in sections of the railroad corridor that abut parcels owned by Lucier plaintiffs Kris Allen O'Bannon, Jan Pettigrew,5 Scott L. and Susan K. Putzier, Keith D. Quentin, Kenneth T. and Shannon L. Kratina, Jon Sandberg, Robert M. and Kathleen L Shaputis, and Skiview Estates Association, and Beattie plaintiff Clinton L. Termini. Although the four right of way deeds conveyed different parcels of land that abut different plaintiffs' properties and were executed for different amounts and on different dates, the operative language of each of the four deeds is substantially the same. The Austin deed, in pertinent part, is reproduced6 below:
This Indenture, Made and entered into this 27th day of September 1890, by and between E.W. Austin and D. L. Austin his wife, of the County of Thurston in the Sate [sic] of Washington, party of the first part, and The Tacoma, Olympia, and Gray's Harbor Railroad Company, a corporation,duly incorporated and existing under the laws of the State of Washington, party of the second part. Witneseth, That for and in consideration of the sum of One Hundred Dollars, in lawful money of the United States, to said party of the first part in had paid by said party of the second part, the receipt whereof is hereby acknowledged, the said parties of the first part have granted, and hereby do grant to the said party of the second part, its successors and assigns, a right of way One Hundred feet in width, for the construction, operation and maintenance of said railroad company's proposed line of railroad: on, over, across, and through the following described tracts or parcels of land situated in Thurston County, State of Washington, as follows to wit: That certain part of the Nelson Barnes donation land claim lying in the northwest quarter (1/4) of section eight (8) township seventeen (17) north, range two (2) west, Willamette Meridian and said parties of the first part have granted, bargained and sold, and by these presents do grant, bargain, sell and convey and warrant to said party of the second part and to its successors and assigns, as and for such right of way a strip of land fifty feet in width, on each side of the centre line of said...
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