SLO County homeowners don’t want coastal trail on their road. Now they are suing
Ten Morro Bay homeowners have filed a lawsuit against the county and other agencies, alleging that a planned coastal trail along their narrow private road would decrease safety and violate public easement agreements.
If approved, the Toro Lane trail alignment and change to the easement could also have a chilling effect on other property owners who might want a similar easement arrangement with cities, San Luis Obispo County or the California Coastal Commission, according to Babak Naficy, the attorney representing the North Point-Morro Bay Homeowners Association.
Naficy filed the lawsuit Dec. 11 in San Luis Obispo Superior Court. County supervisors will get their first look at it during a closed session with counsel on Tuesday.
When reached for comment, assistant county counsel Jon Ansolabehere described the lawsuit as “a little ridiculous.”
“Although the county typically does not comment on matters which are the subject of litigation, the suggestion that the Morro Bay to Cayucos Connector Trail cannot use Toro Lane is a little ridiculous considering that there is an easement along the private road for the express purpose of allowing the public to get to and from the shoreline,” Ansolabehere said in an email to The Tribune on Jan. 10.
“The easement allows for ‘unlimited pedestrian volume’ and was a permit requirement when the previous property owner converted an old motel at this location into a residential subdivision,” he explained.
He and county counsel Rita Neal sent a letter to Naficy on May 18 after being notified of the HOA’s intention to pursue a lawsuit.
“Any litigation is premature, as no project has been approved,” Ansolabehere wrote in the letter.
Supervisor Bruce Gibson; Elizabeth Kavanaugh, the county’s planner on the project; and Sarah Christie, legislative analyst for the Coastal Commission, said separately they couldn’t comment on the lawsuit.
HOA’s objections include increased traffic, public safety concerns
As currently laid out, the trail would wend its way south from Cayucos through various types of locations that range from along Highway 1 to blufftops on the shoreline, through parking areas and along some residential streets, before ending in Morro Bay.
One of those residential roadways is Toro Lane — a short, ocean-front street that runs north from Yerba Buena Street, dead-ending at the North Point Natural Area.
A previous alignment plan for that portion of the trail had it running on the narrow land strip between Toro Lane and Highway 1, according to Naficy and HOA president Karl Levy.
That’s where the Toro Lane homeowners had assumed for years that the trail was going to be placed, the two men said, and the HOA was never formally told that the design had changed.
However, an updated plan moved the trail onto the narrow lane.
At the Yerba Buena Street turn, the road narrows from 23 feet wide to 16 feet, a point that Levy calls “the neck of the hourglass for traffic that includes garbage trucks, delivery trucks and emergency vehicles.”
The proposed trail alignment would affect 14 feet of that, he said.
The expected influx of cyclists and hikers passing through on a formal trail would not only change the neighborhood vibe, it would compromise safety for all, Levy and Naficy said.
“Our street is mostly pedestrian, with no sidewalks and no parking on the either side of the street, as specified by the HOA,” Levy said. “Everybody shares the space … residents, kids, dog walkers.”
