Dozens of plaintiffs have filed a federal lawsuit against SMART accusing the rail authority of illegally building its bicycle and pedestrian path through their properties without their permission.
Nearly 50 Sonoma County residents and businesses filed the case this month in U.S. District Court of Northern California, alleging the transit agency lacked the authority in its easements to build the path along the railroad right of way through their properties. One of their attorneys, Tom Stewart, said SMART’s easement is only allowed for railroad purposes and not for a path.
By building the path, SMART is illegally taking the property from these residents without compensation and is therefore violating their Fifth Amendment rights, Stewart said.
“We’re not either for or against hiking or biking trails,” Stewart said. “We are for SMART doing it properly.”
The plaintiffs are seeking a court order requiring Sonoma-Marin Area Rail Transit to pay damages that could equal the value of their properties. Depending on how a judge rules, that could be millions of dollars for the young transit agency, which launched service in 2017.
Stewart said it is unlikely a judge would order the existing path to be removed.
SMART general counsel Tom Lyons said the district is still assessing the allegations.
“Clearly we’re going to have to look at records dating back to the late 1800s and see what each of those records reflects, what interest was granted to the railroad that we have since acquired or received,” Lyons said.
The construction of a bicycle and pedestrian path along the rail corridor was a major selling point to Marin and Sonoma voters in 2008 to pass the quarter-cent sales tax that funds the system. SMART’s vision of a 70-mile passenger rail line between Larkspur and Cloverdale would also include 52 miles of path that runs parallel to the railroad. So far, the district operates about 45 miles of rail between Larkspur and Santa Rosa and a patchwork of various trail sections completed alongside it.
Part advocates plan to follow the case closely. Marin County Bicycle Coalition policy and planning director Warren Wells said their organization “hopes and believes that the lawsuit will be resolved in favor of SMART, allowing it to carry out the vision promised in 2008 to voters in Marin and Sonoma Counties, that of a continuous pedestrian and biking pathway paralleling the rail line from Larkspur to Cloverdale.”
Stewart said SMART had the ability to build a path through a process laid out under the National Trails System Act of 1983, but chose not to follow it. The law allows unused rail corridors to be “railbanked,” which preserves the rail corridor should it be needed in the future, but does allow for interim uses such as trails when it is not being used.
The state is seeking to railbank part of the Northwestern Pacific Railroad in parts of the North Coast for its planned Great Redwood Trail, which is envisioned to run from Novato to Eureka.
SMART’s existing easements on the Sonoma properties do not allow for both a rail and a path, Stewart said. To be compliant with the law, SMART will have to choose between a path or an operating rail line, but cannot have both, Stewart said.
There is a possibility the National Trails System Act could be applicable to their path, Lyons said. However, SMART’s enabling legislation passed by the state Legislature in 2002 through Assembly Bill 2224 states that SMART is supposed to provide rail transit works and facilities, which include an ancillary bike path, Lyons said.
“It’s not exactly our position that this is a hiking and trail pathway, but more of a railroad purpose,” Lyons said.
The lawsuit could shift its target from SMART to the federal government, depending on how SMART responds to the litigation, Stewart said. If a judge rules against SMART and the rail line decides to follow the national trails legislation, any damages would be limited to a temporary taking, which would be based on how long the path had been on the properties, he said. In that case, the lawsuit would then convert to a suit against the federal government for Fifth Amendment violations, according to Stewart. The amendment requires “just compensation” for private property taken for public use.
If SMART does not comply with the National Trails System Act, it could face damages for the permanent taking of private property, which would equal the value of the property, Stewart said.
“There is not a specific dollar figure in there,” Stewart said of the complaint. “We don’t know if it’s going to be a temporary taking or a permanent taking.”
