Rogelmair v. City of Los Angeles

SPENCE, J.

Plaintiffs, as owners of a piece of real property bordering upon Griffith Park in the City of Los Angeles, claimed an easement for ingress and egress to and from said property over a strip of land situated within said park. They brought this action to enjoin the defendants from constructing a fence along the boundary line of said park upon the portion thereof over which plaintiffs claimed such easement. Judgment was entered in favor of plaintiffs and from said judgment defendants appeal.

It is extremely difficult to give a detailed description of plaintiffs’ land and the courses of the roads now and heretofore leading into Griffith Park to the north of said property. Several maps were introduced in evidence for this purpose. We believe, however, that despite the irregular shape of Griffith Park, the irregular shape of plaintiffs’ land and the irregular courses of said roads, a rough description may be given which will suffice for the purposes of this appeal.

Plaintiffs’ lot consists of a long, wedge-shaped piece running in a general northerly-southerly direction, said lot being narrower at the northerly end than at the southerly end. It is contiguous to the easterly boundary line of said park. It was formerly a part of a larger tract of land, which larger tract was bounded on the west by said park and on the north by what was formerly known as Tropico Avenue. Said larger tract was then unsubdivided. Said Tropico Avenue was then a 40-foot road which ran up to a point near the easterly boundary line of said park and then

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turned in a southwesterly direction into the park and shortly thereafter crossed a bridge over a flood control channel. In 1909 said road was widened to 60 feet. Its name was then changed to Los Feliz Boulevard. In 1922 plaintiffs’ predecessor in interest, who was the original sub-divider of the large tract, placed on record a tract map and dedicated to public use an additional 20-foot strip on the south side of Los Feliz Boulevard, which strip curved slightly to the southwest as it approached the easterly boundary line of Griffith Park. Thereafter Los Feliz Boulevard was improved up to said boundary line as a 100-foot road. With the dedication and improvement of said boulevard as widened to 100 feet, plaintiffs’ lot for the first time became contiguous to a road. The narrow blunt northerly end of plaintiffs’ wedge-shaped lot then had a curved frontage of approximately 46 feet along the property line on Los Feliz Boulevard. Thereafter, the course of the road through the park was altered slightly to the north in order to connect with a new bridge over the flood control channel, which new bridge was slightly to the north of the old bridge. But despite this change, the maps show that plaintiffs had ample means of ingress and egress to and from their property over land dedicated for use as a public street outside of the park boundary. There is no evidence to show that there was ever a road within the park contiguous to the westerly boundary line of plaintiffs’ property and from plaintiffs’ own exhibits it appears that the roads above mentioned merely crossed the easterly boundary line of the park and continued into the park in a southwesterly direction without touching plaintiffs’ land at any point after so crossing. If the course of the road within the park had not been altered to the north so as to run over the new bridge, said road within the park would have been closer to plaintiffs’ westerly property line than the present road but it would not have been contiguous to the westerly property line thereof. The practical reason for plaintiffs’ desire to obtain an easement over the park property and to enjoin the defendants from building a fence upon the boundary line of said park property may be easily understood. As above stated, plaintiffs have a curved fronttage on Los Feliz Boulevard of about 46 feet at the property line. If plaintiffs’ easterly and westerly lines are extended, they converge and form the point of the wedge near the