Projo 7 to 7 News Blog

For the rest of the year, the road has been open to everyone for generations, according to Don Morris, a long-time shoreline-rights advocate. He said he drives to the western side of Quonochontaug Breachway almost every morning to fish. He is a member of Rhode Island Mobile Sportsmen, a club that owns property near the state land.

Morris was one of several people, including Todd Fiske, who testified against the proposed parking ban during a public hearing Tuesday evening in Warwick.

No one testified in favor of the proposed ban.

Michael L. Lapisky, chief of the state Division of Fish and Wildlife, was in charge of the hearing. His agency oversees the state land where parking would be prohibited. The land would still be open to anyone who could walk to it or paddle to it from the state boat landing on the eastern side of the breachway, he said.

Some landowners along the road contend that anyone who drives to the state land is trespassing. So, said Lapisky, “We have a piece of state property made inaccessible by private property….One can’t get there except by walking or by boat.”

Lapisky said he will work toward a compromise to resolve the dispute. “We are trying to work with all parties to make this thing work out somehow,” he said.

Several opponents of the parking ban say the disagreement is between the wealthy and everyone else. If the state concedes to wealthy landowners who want to close the road altogether, it would set a precedent, said Todd Fiske, whose family has owned a home there for 30 years. He said that even he could lose access to his family’s property. “Money talks,” said his sister.

James Milardo, president of Rhode Island Mobile Sportsmen, another landowner on the road, also testified against the proposed parking ban. However, he and the club’s lawyer, R. Daniel Prentiss, said they will negotiate with other landowners toward a compromise, rather than go to court.

“These people are connected,” Milardo said. “Even though it seems like a slam-dunk for us, they can afford to wait for the right judge, and we can still lose it. So we’re saying the best way to go is to get an agreement between the two parties, and to come to some solution.”

Though the road dispute has continued for generations, environmental police investigator Longtin said it has descended to new depths with the concealed nail boards. “This was really aggressive and malicious,” he said.

He estimated that three cars lost their tires to the nail traps on May 24, but no one reported injuries. “A kid could have stepped on one of these with three-inch nails,” he said. “Nasty.”

The boards were 18-by-6-inch plywood, each with several 3-inch nails that appeared to have been driven with a nail gun, he said. They were spread along the length of the road.

Anyone who has information about the nail traps, he said, should call the Rhode Island Environmental Police at 222-3070.

“It was very aggressive,” he said. “You don’t know what could have happened.”