Thread: Farmer lying about paper road?

Originally Posted by Moa Hunter

A friend of mine who works at the local council told me that when the council receives an application to close a ULR, if there has been no public use or interest in that road recorded by the council, closure will be approved with the stroke of a pen and not need to be gazetted.

What is the importance and implication of the above ? In application the landowner, if they can bluff and exclude the public from using the section of public land that is the road (ULR), can at no cost convert a public asset to freehold title. So a 20mtr wide ULR stretching one kilometer is two hectares and will have a value of between $20,000 and $100,000 commonly. A form of legalised squatters rights / land grab.
This is land that was excluded from the original farm purchase but that they have occupied and earnt income off for years and can now sell with the property

Dont be fooled that this is a rare occurrence, and bs it is common now since Tenor Review.

A parallel would be a gang with HQ next to a council reserve in town occupying the reserve, fencing it off and applying to the council for the reserve to be added to their adjoining freehold title because the public havent used it for years

I have to disagree with the parallel you have drawn here. In the cases I know of it would be more like having a public walkway / cycle lane beside your property, and burglars using it to access your property to steal your stuff, or motorcyclists using it as a skid pad on a Saturday night. But with one difference - you would be responsible for maintenance of the walkway and NOT the council......

Or in your example if it was not a gang next to the reserve, but instead it was your place, and every weekend you had to spend a couple hours mowing the grass there and picking up all the rubbish and carcasses left there...Sure it is council land, but they dont do anything. As I mentioned before, we have a fairly substantial paper road next to us and the neighbouring properties. The developer offered to landscape it into a birdlane / reserve as part of the subdivision, but while the council was not against the idea in principle, the roading division liked it as it meant it was no longer responsible for it (it did no maintenance anyway so it was no skin off their nose), Parks division objected vigourously against it as it would then have to maintain it as a reserve with no additional funding so it was declined and was left as a paper road. Apart from the local farmer mowing it twice a year for hay,that is all. It receives no attention from the council unless it is pointed out that it is becoming a fire risk. The local residents including myself, now mow it themselves just to keep it from becoming a fire risk or source of pestilence and so people can walk it if they desire. To give you and idea, when I first called to enquire about who is responsible for the paper road, the council replied "The land owner whose fence it is inside, is responsible as they get the use of it. But the developer was not ALLOWED to put the fences around the paper road and it is OUTSIDE of our fence. To give you an idea of size, this paper road is 300m long, and for the most part, about 10m wide with a narrow pinch point that is about 3 feet wide not far from the main road where it starts meaning it is a reasonable piece of land to be mowing.......especially when we cannot use it for anything else...Oh and the real kicker....I can build a structure within 2 metres of my boundary EXCEPT from the road frontage which has a 10 metre setback.....and the BACK of my section has the same 10m set back as the paper road counts as "road" in the consents division so if I want to make a garden shed I dont need a building consent due to its small size, but I do need a resource consent because I want to put within 10m of my back fence.....

Originally Posted by timattalon

I have to disagree with the parallel you have drawn here. In the cases I know of it would be more like having a public walkway / cycle lane beside your property, and burglars using it to access your property to steal your stuff, or motorcyclists using it as a skid pad on a Saturday night. But with one difference - you would be responsible for maintenance of the walkway and NOT the council......

Or in your example if it was not a gang next to the reserve, but instead it was your place, and every weekend you had to spend a couple hours mowing the grass there and picking up all the rubbish and carcasses left there...Sure it is council land, but they dont do anything. As I mentioned before, we have a fairly substantial paper road next to us and the neighbouring properties. The developer offered to landscape it into a birdlane / reserve as part of the subdivision, but while the council was not against the idea in principle, the roading division liked it as it meant it was no longer responsible for it (it did no maintenance anyway so it was no skin off their nose), Parks division objected vigourously against it as it would then have to maintain it as a reserve with no additional funding so it was declined and was left as a paper road. Apart from the local farmer mowing it twice a year for hay,that is all. It receives no attention from the council unless it is pointed out that it is becoming a fire risk. The local residents including myself, now mow it themselves just to keep it from becoming a fire risk or source of pestilence and so people can walk it if they desire. To give you and idea, when I first called to enquire about who is responsible for the paper road, the council replied "The land owner whose fence it is inside, is responsible as they get the use of it. But the developer was not ALLOWED to put the fences around the paper road and it is OUTSIDE of our fence. To give you an idea of size, this paper road is 300m long, and for the most part, about 10m wide with a narrow pinch point that is about 3 feet wide not far from the main road where it starts meaning it is a reasonable piece of land to be mowing.......especially when we cannot use it for anything else...Oh and the real kicker....I can build a structure within 2 metres of my boundary EXCEPT from the road frontage which has a 10 metre setback.....and the BACK of my section has the same 10m set back as the paper road counts as "road" in the consents division so if I want to make a garden shed I dont need a building consent due to its small size, but I do need a resource consent because I want to put within 10m of my back fence.....

Are you quite sure that next to your property is a ULR or is it just a parcel of council land designated to roading ? The standard for a road is a minimum 'chain' or 66 feet - 20 metres. Your parcel is only 10 metres tapering to 1 metre so cannot be a road as such only an access right of way or sum such. Fence it off, park Harleys on it and patrol it with gang members and see how much the public use it. Then you can apply to the council to 'take it over' for them

Originally Posted by Moa Hunter

Are you quite sure that next to your property is a ULR or is it just a parcel of council land designated to roading ? The standard for a road is a minimum 'chain' or 66 feet - 20 metres. Your parcel is only 10 metres tapering to 1 metre so cannot be a road as such only an access right of way or sum such. Fence it off, park Harleys on it and patrol it with gang members and see how much the public use it. Then you can apply to the council to 'take it over' for them

Definitely a paper road. And I would not leave a Harley parked where public has access (or thinks it ihas access...) as it would be gone 5 minutes later...