Adirondack League Club v. Sierra Club
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Adirondack League Club vs. Sierra Club was a court case decided on December 17, 1998, by New York's highest court, the New York Court of Appeals, denying the defendants' motions for summary judgment that the South Branch of the Moose River flowing through Adirondack League Club property was a public highway, but holding that recreational use can be considered in determining if a river is a public highway.[1] The case was sent back to the trial court for additional review. However, the case was settled before there was a final court determination as to whether the river was a public highway. The settlement, which can be found under Appendix 12 of the Moose River Plains Wild Forest Unit Management Plan, allows the public to use the river at certain times of the year and under certain conditions.[2]
Adirondack League Club v. Sierra Club | |
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Court | New York Court of Appeals |
Argued | October 22, 1998 |
Decided | December 17, 1998 |
Citation(s) | 92 N.Y.2d 591; 706 N.E.2d 1192; 684 N.Y.S.2d 168 |
Case history | |
Prior history | 201 A.D.2d 225, 615 N.Y.S.2d 788 (1994) |
Court membership | |
Chief judge | Judith S. Kaye |
Associate judges | Joseph W. Bellacosa, Howard A. Levine, George Bundy Smith, Carmen Beauchamp Ciparick, Richard C. Wesley, Denman |
Case opinions | |
Majority | Ciparick, joined by Smith, Wesley, Denman |
Dissent | Bellacosa |
Kaye, Levine took no part in the consideration or decision of the case. |
Although Adirondack League Club vs. Sierra Club established that recreational use can be considered in determining whether a river is a public highway, in Friends of Thayer Lake, LLC v. Brown, the New York Court of Appeals declined to answer whether the capacity for recreational use alone is sufficient to prove that a river is a public highway, and sent the case back to the trial court for consideration of "the Waterway's historical and prospective commercial utility, the Waterway's historical accessibility to the public, the relative ease of passage by canoe, the volume of historical travel, and the volume of prospective commercial and recreational use."[3] The trial court ruled in favor of the landowners,[4] and the decision was not appealed.[5]