Updated August 17.
The Trustees of Reservations, which manages various conservation lands on Martha’s Vineyard, was deemed by a Massachusetts Land Court judge to have overstepped its bounds on Cape Poge, bringing to question where oversand vehicles will be allowed on Chappaquiddick Island’s northern point.
Land Court Judge Sarah Turano-Flores ruled on Tuesday, Aug. 11 that the Trustees violated the easement rights of Victor and Dawn Robert Bruno Colantonio, Cape Poge property owners, and that the nonprofit organization had overburdened the area by allowing visitors on oversand vehicles to traverse its trails.
The case was one page of the extensive disputes between Cape Poge landowners, who have called for the protection of the natural space, and beach access advocates, who’ve called for the preservation of historically accessible beach routes. And this suit, filed by the Colantonios in 2022, dealt with the strip of land beloved by fishermen and beachgoers. They alleged that the Trustees “selling access to private way and beaches to thousands of people each year overburdens the shared easement and constitutes a nuisance.”
“This is a very significant ruling because the judge has undertaken a very comprehensive analysis of … what is good environmental stewardship of the land,” Denise Chicoine, the attorney who represented the Colantonios, told The Times.
Victor Colantonio said in an email that the results at land court was a win for Cape Poge and was in spirit to how the parcels in the area were meant to be used.
“Purposely brought to land court, there is no monetary damages sought or awarded,” Colantonio said.
The Trustees are still processing the legal blow.
“We are still reviewing the ruling with our legal team and considering our options,” Mary Dettloff, Trustees public relations director, said in an email. “We will have more to say in the coming days.”
The case focused on a trail near the Cape Poge Lighthouse that provide the land route to the areas known as the Cape Poge elbow and the Cape Poge gut.
The transactions described in the Turano-Flores’ order that is the groundwork for the suit are complex, but a key document of the case was the 1891 Decree, issued the same year the Trustees were founded. Through this decree, 330 acres of Cape Poge were divided by Dukes County Probate Court into 17 lots, for 11 proprietors. Currently, the Trustees own 10 of these lots, the first of which was acquired in 1959. The decree also established five original ways, although more trails were established over the years.
While the Trustees acquired additional land and easements since the 1891 decree, Turano-Flores stated the way the organization was utilizing the easements exceeded how they were meant to be used based on the 19th century decree. The judge wrote that while opening up the easement to visitors didn’t specifically violate the decree, the Trustees’ unlimited sale of oversand vehicle permits “impermissibly transforms the original purpose of the 1891 Easement to one that exceeds the scope of the original easement” and led to overly intensive use of the area.
Turano-Flores noted the environmental impact having numerous vehicles traversing the area could produce, such as erosion. But she also raised safety concerns about the trails based on what she witnessed on Cape Poge in October. She noted the narrowness of some paths only allowed for one vehicle to pass at a time, which could lead to issues during the busy season.
“During the view, we encountered only a dozen or so other drivers on the Partition Ways,” Turano Flores wrote. “Nevertheless, on several occasions, because the trails are so narrow, with no room for two cars to pass each other simultaneously, we were forced to back up for a good distance to find a place to pull over and let the other car go by. Not only was this a safety concern, it also caused a substantial delay in the time it took us to traverse the partition locus.”
Chicoine said the order pertained to the privately owned Cape Poge easements based on the 1891 plan, so there wouldn’t be ramifications for areas owned by the Trustees or off of the easement, such as the restored trail that was recently approved by the Edgartown Conservation Commission connecting Wasque Reservation and Leland Beach. But a court session is scheduled for Tuesday, August 18, to bring clarity on how the ruling will be applied.
Some “heavily disputed” portions of the case, including the Trustees’ claim of having used a path that cuts into Colantonio land without complaints for 20 years — conditions that could give the conservation organization right of use to the area if the judge sides with them — and whether the organization had become a nuisance or even trespassed onto the Colantonios’ properties by exceeding the scope of a 1897 easement, were deemed by Turano-Flores to require a trial due to a lack of conclusive evidence, and were not determined in this week’s order.
Editor’s note: Updated to include information from Victor Colantonio.
