Thread: Unformed legal road/ Paper Road access

Originally Posted by bully

I never said shoot someone, you just have to scare someone to be in trouble. There's other typical farm hazards too.
I guess it depends a bit on the track and farm your talking about, as each situation is different. (I'm thinking track right through the middle, others might be along the edge)
I'm not one to be walking through someone else's property weather there's a paper road or not, I would ask. Good luck with the fuck you it's a public road I'm going anyway approach.

I didn't say anything about not talking to them first, its the polite thing to do and plenty of farmers are good sorts and offer the use of their nice convenient track instead of a paper road with fences across it etc. If they ask me not to use it temporarily for a good reason thats fine, I'm a reasonable person too.

But the simple fact is they don't have any right to stop people using it - if you're walking along the road then you aren't walking through their property, legally it would be like trying to stop you going past their property on a formed road. If they put a sign up warning of any unexpected hazards I imagine that would cover most of their H+S responsibilities well enough.

Probably worth adding too though, if access along the legal road isn't practical (cut off by a cliff or river etc) you don't have any rights to go through the neighbouring land to get around the obstacle. Legal access isn't a guarantee of practical access.