BEACON – The Metro-North Railroad is planning to abandon its Beacon Line that runs from Beacon to Fishkill, Hopewell Junction, Stormville, and Putnam County and integrate it into the Dutchess Rail Trail and the 750-mile Empire State Trail.
The original land for the track was in the form of an easement by the property owners and conversion to a rail trail, or linear park, would retain that right-of-way.
That’s where lawyer Steven Wald comes in to seek benefits for the landowners.
“Once these recreational trail conversions occur, since the landowners of today, like the original landowners, owned that land, they are supposed to get that land back upon railroad abandonment, but that abandonment gets blocked by the federal law and so it gets turned into a trail instead,” he said. “So, landowners, because they don’t get their land back, because that railroad abandonment process is blocked, they have the right to obtain compensation from the federal government for the taking of their land.”
Wald said they have nothing against converting the abandoned track into a linear park; it’s only about converting the trail to a public trust, the public at large should pay for it.
