Supreme Court rules in Favor of Wyoming Private Landowner

Like many landowners, Brandt’s ties to the land span back decades. Brandt’s father began work at a saw mill located on the 83 acre property in 1939. He later purchased the saw mill and moved his family to Fox Park in 1946. In 1976 the United States conveyed that land to Brandt’s parents in a land patent which contained part of a right of way for a 66-mile railroad abandoned in 2004.

The Rails-to-Trails project constructed a bike path seen in green on this map cutting through Brandt's 83 acre property in Fox Park.

By an 8-1 vote, the justices held in Marvin Brandt Revocable Trust v. United States that the government had no right to the ten acres covered by Brandt’s Fox Park tract once the railroad formally abandoned the property because the right of way was an easement granted to a rail company under the General Railroad Right of Way Act of 1875 and that under well-established common law property principles, the easement was terminated by the railroad’s abandonment, leaving Brandt’s land unburdened. The ruling reverses a lower federal appellate court ruling in favor of the Forest Service.

Chief Justice John Roberts, said “the Government loses this case in large part because it won when it argued the opposite before this Court more than 70 years ago, in Great Northern Railway Co. v United States”. The 2006 Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals ruling that the Government retained a right of continued use for hikers and bicyclists of the abandoned right of way which crosses 30 landowners and Brandt’s private property contradicts the Government’s position in the Great Northern case. The Court refused to “endorse such a stark change in position” and Roberts referred to the Government’s testimony as a “self-serving” contradictory position stating that the Court “cannot over look the irony” of the Government’s arguments on other Supreme Court rulings.

As outlined in our guiding principles, FLA believes that increasing efforts by local, state, federal and non-governmental organizations to restrict and encumber private forestlands without fair compensation are excessive and misplaced regulations that jeopardize the sustainability of private forests. FLA commends the Supreme Court’s decision to halt the Government’s efforts to encumber Brandt’s private forestland without fair compensation. This is a victory for Marvin Brandt which could potentially influence more than 90 lawsuits against the Justice Department challenging Rails-to-Trails projects involving 10,000 properties in over 30 states.

Click here to read the Court’s opinion.