Harbor Road raises resident concerns

The year-long debate over who owns a portion of Harbor Road near the Shelburne Shipyard resurfaced at a recent selectboard meeting, leaving some residents to fear what might happen if it’s turned into a private road.

The issue began over a year ago when Safe Harbor Marina, the Texas-based company that owns the historic Shelburne Shipyard, proposed a multimillion-dollar expansion that would increase its boat and dock capacity by 20 percent.

According to development review board meeting minutes, plans would create multiple improvements to the company’s 15.4-acre property, including a relocation of the access road to the property’s southern end and the reconstruction of a clubhouse and administration building.

Among a slew of environmental and safety concerns, the Harborwood Shores Property Owners Association — a group of 31 people who own property next to the shipyard — raised concerns over Safe Harbor Marina’s original application that claimed it owned a 0.14-mile stretch of Harbor Road just north of Chateaugay Road.

“The first time that this road was ever marked as private property conclusively was with the engineering construction drawings that were submitted with the shipyard,” association member Annemarie Curley said at the selectboard meeting last week. “We haven’t seen any of the material that actually backs up how they arrived at that decision.”

Although several decades of history claim that portion as a town road, town manager Matt Lawless said that the oldest property transaction from 1828 shows it may have not always been this way.

“The oldest historical argument that could be made on the shipyard’s behalf is to stick with the original survey from 1828,” he said.

A more recent 1966 case involving the town and the shipyard found that the public status of Harbor Road was never contested.

Lawless said the town’s legal counsel explained that since the town has been plowing and striping and maintaining this road for many years, as far up as the current gate of the shipyard, the road could be considered a de facto public highway.

“That is reflected in the current state highway maps. Every year we get a map from the state confirming the town road system, and it does go all the way out around that hook and has for several decades, to the 1960s at least,” he said.

Some neighbors fear that should the road become a private drive, cars will be forced to turn down Chateaugay Road, creating unnecessary increased traffic flow and safety hazards for the nearby neighborhood.

“One of my chief concerns is that because of the car dealerships on Shelburne Road, everyone loves to test drive their car right down to the end of Shelburne Point and now they’re going to test drive it right through our neighborhood,” former homeowner association member Mary Kehoe said. “It’s just not safe to have everybody turn down our neighborhood.”

Paul Goodrich, the town’s superintendent for over 50 years, is in favor of the property transfer and sees the use of town resources to maintain this potentially private road as a significant liability and waste of time.

“We’ve been plowing it, we did everything down there from day one,” said Goodrich. “There’s a lot of liability sitting down there for the town of Shelburne right now.”

He explained that the seawall on the beach just off Harbor Road is “ready to cave in,” and when it inevitably does, “that isn’t a 50-cent project, it’s millions,” he said. “The best thing (the town) can do now is let the shipyard own it immediately. As a taxpayer, I am a little upset that this wasn’t taken care of before.”

Mark Lurvey, general manager of the Shipyard, wasn’t at the meeting, but Goodrich said Lurvey and his team are ready to take immediate ownership of the road.

But members of the homeowner’s association said they have also been in communication with Lurvey, and the shipyard is redoing its plans.

“They’re going to keep the existing road and they wanted to keep it as is so that really changes the makeup of the plans and what their intentions were for that area,” Curley said.

Lurvey could not be reached for comment, but development review board coordinator Kit Luster did confirm the original application is still awaiting Act 250 review and has not been withdrawn.

Lawless said that the discussion has not yet reached a point of action, and the selectboard advised him to seek legal guidance on options for a way forward.

“There are all sorts of things they want to do there to develop it,” said homeowner association member Mary Hurley. “If you find that that’s their road, they could shut it down and just make it a pedestrian walk park for their Shipyard. There’s a lot more involved, it’s not just a seawall issue. It’s an issue of proper ownership.”