Can I Install a Driveway Gate Within a Utility Easement

My question involves an easement in the state of: Virginia

I have utility lines with a 30' wide utility easement running east-west across my northern property line (the outside edge of the easement is the property line as the easement runs parallel to the state road in front of my house). My driveway runs north-south across my eastern property line (or close enough to call it that). I would like to install a gate near the end of my driveway. Doing so will restrict access to the utility easement as the end of my driveway is cut down through a hill to access the state road, resulting in the far end of my otherwise level driveway sloping down rather dramatically to the road. This slope starts at the inside edge of the utility easement (coincidence, I'm thinking simply because of the lay of the land). So, even if I install the gate at the inside edge of the utility easement, the utility trucks will not have access to my utility pole because of the small hillsides on either side of the driveway inside the easement at that point. I hope I've drawn a good verbal picture.

My question is: may I install a gate in my driveway that will have the unintended result of restricting access for utility companies? The gate may be padlocked at times for security reasons (which is, after all, the reason for the gate). I've learned from existing forum questions that utility companies do not need to provide a homeowner notice, nor ask permission to perform duties within the easement. If I am legally permitted to install the gate where I want it (which will, quite unintentionally) block access to the easement, what will happen if they show up to perform a task and my gate is locked?

The simple solution would be to move the location of the gate far enough back to allow a truck access to the easement without having to pass through the gate. But to do that would negate the need for a gate. If I have to move it that far back, it would be so close to the house as to be insufficient for security purposes. I see an inordinate amount of traffic in my driveway - sometimes people just come up and turn around, which is an odd thing to do in the rural area where I live. I also see way too many solicitors who ignore "no trespassing" and "no soliciting" signs. So, by "security" I understand that a gate will not keep out prowlers or burglars. This is not my intent. My purpose is to keep uninvited, unwanted traffic out of my driveway and away from my garage and house. Especially since many don't use the parking area to turn around and just back up indiscriminately in my yard, killing my grass and leaving ruts. (I really don't know what comes over people, to do such things.)

Also, the initial plan was to install a rail fence extending east-west across my yard along the inside edge of the utility easement. This would respect the easement, but would further restrict access to utility workers and their trucks: even if they got through the gate, they wouldn't be able to get back through the fence to access my utility pole.

Note: the western edge of the easement is accessible directly from my neighbor's driveway, which runs along the outside of my western property line. But I understand it's impractical to ask the utility companies to use my neighbor's driveway to access my utility easement and my utility pole, even if my neighbors are agreeable.

So, can I install the gate without expecting repercussions from the utility companies? Can I install my fence running along the inside edge of the easement?

Thank you for your help.

Edit: It occurs to me to clarify that the utility companies cannot currently access either the overhead lines or the pole from within the existing easement. Even without the barriers of the gate and/or fence, they must still enter my property via my driveway, go *past* the inner edge of the easement, then turn right through my front yard and backtrack a few feet to access the easement and the utility pole. To leave, they would reverse the process.

Or, in the case of the utility truck that visited today, drive up my driveway more than 200 feet to my house, make what I've counted to be a 6 point (at least) turn (judging by the ruts) in my side yard and driveway, running over and through 2 large piles of mulch and hitting 2 trees in the process. I don't mind them turning around in my front yard, but that was a bit excessive, especially since the ground was soft after receiving all of that rain from Sandy. I digress ...

So, even now they cannot truly access the utility pole without exceeding the limits of the easement. Would my gate and/or fence cause more trouble than they will be worth?

You can install anything you want as long as either the utility companies involved have given permission or it does not obstruct the utility companies free access to their property within the easement. That means you can put a gate immediately on the house side of the easement where it crosses your drive without their permission. If you do anything to restrict their access, you would need their express permission to do so.

If you place a fence or gate outside of the easement, on the house side of the easement, and it restricts the utility company's access to their property within the easement, well, too bad for them. You do not have to allow any access other than what they have been legally granted.

Thank you for your clear response. I now totally understand the situation and my rights regarding my property and the easement.

I don't wish to anger the utility companies, but I do want to be able to make the most of my property. I now solicit an opinion: From a practical standpoint, would it be worth it to move ahead with my gate/fence plan?

The utility companies have very few reasons to visit the site (I see a truck maybe once every few years), but they do come out every now and again and when they do I'm sure they are expecting unrestricted access to their easement through my yard (since they cannot access the easement from the public right of way due to the hillside between the easement and the road).

If I were to cut off access to the easement from my driveway, what would the utility companies be able to do? Leaving the gate open when I know they're coming is a solution to the gate problem (except, of course, they are not required to give notice before showing up). But once the fence is in (on the house side of the easement), I'd like it to remain there. What I want to avoid is coming home one day to find the gate off it's hinges, the fence flattened to the ground and the dogs running loose in the neighborhood because an over-enthusiastic utility worker decided the fence was in his way.

Would/Could the companies retaliate by demanding a wider easement, forcing me to give up more of my front yard? Or by cutting further into the hillside on that side of my driveway (within their currently established easement) to make a path accesible by their trucks? If so, I would seriously rethink my plans. If they can't do that, I will proceed. I just don't want to make waves.

Have you contacted the utility to get their take on the issue?

They might be willing to make a notation to notify you whenever they need to access the easement from your property since this would probably be an easier/cheaper solution than cutting away the hillside to give them access to the easement from the public ROW. Of course the granting language of the easement may already give them permission to access it from your property which would make this a moot point.

From what I've read on this forum, most utilities have departments that handle easement issues. So you may be able to contact them and work something out that makes everyone happy or at least come to an understanding about what rights each of you have.

If you place a gate blocking their access to the easement, you might find it in much worse condition that taken off the hinges. They have no real obligation to be nice to the gate if it blocks their legal access path. They could actually attempt to charge you for the time and costs of removing the gate. If the fence is not within the easement and they damage it, they would be liable for the costs to repair it. They also would be guilty of trespassing and destruction of your property. Of course that is presuming there is nothing that allows them to utilize any of your land outside of the easement. That would make no sense since allowing additional land to be used would essentially be increasing the size of the easement. Why not just seek a larger easement to start?

I think it is important for the OP to understand that the utility probably has more lawyers than he has dogs.

Although this is a new experience for him, the utility has been through this situation before and will have some kind of response ready if presented with a confrontational situation. The OP needs to understand the cost of dealing with the utility in a confrontational manner, which might result in an action for an easement by prescription, necessity, acquiescence, implication, etc. whether there is any legal merit to a claim or not.

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Have you contacted the utility to get their take on the issue?

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This is a good question and it's where I would start if I were trying to resolve the issue in a constructive manner.

I want to thank you all for your good advice. I realize now that my title was misleading - I do not wish to install the gate WITHIN the easement, but at the inside edge. Which, as I've learned, is within my right. But that will cut off the utilities' access from their own easement. Hence the possible bad will from from utilities. You're all right, of course, that the best course of action is to contact the utilities to get their take on the issue. I admit that I wanted to avoid tipping them off to my plans (under the idea that it's better to beg forgiveness than to ask permission). But that is faulty thinking and may get me in over my head. I will contact both the electricity company and the phone company and see what they say. Many thanks to all of you for your contributions to the forum.

Now that you toss in what you have, you have confused things a bit. You need to verify if they have access to the easement via your drive. Remember, the end of your drive is likely within a public right of way. If they do not go beyond the defined public right of way to access the easement, you could not block that.

If the easement grant is written so they can access the actual defined easement via your drive or such, you blocking their access would be no different than putting a fence across the actual defined easement.

The other thing that comes to mind is:

I am presuming the easement runs along with a string of poles. If so, when it comes to the edge of your property, you cannot fence that off without their permission. This would mean there is a gap in your fence which your dogs could escape through.

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I admit that I wanted to avoid tipping them off to my plans (under the idea that it's better to beg forgiveness than to ask permission)

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Not a good idea in this type of situation.

I apologize for any confusion. I understand it's very difficult to picture an individual's specific situation without a plat copy and/or topographical map in hand.

The poles and corresponding easement run along the road. My driveway is perpendicular to the easement. The layout is like a number 7, with the northern line being the state road and easement (which run parallel to each other as the poles and lines follow the roadway) and the eastern line being my driveway. The remainder of my property (and my house) fall to the south and west of the borders created by the road and driveway.

To clarify: I don't want to do anything inside the easement. I want to run a fence and install a gate parallel to the easement, along the house-side edge of the easement. This will not box in the easement as what I am basically doing is chopping a 30' wide swath off of the front of my yard (which is the easement as it runs parallel to the state road).

Here's the crux of the problem: My property sits about 15 feet higher than the state road. There is a very steep hillside (it's really a small cliff) where my property meets the state road right of way, where they dug lengthwise through the hill to make the state road. There is a corresponding cliff on the other side of the state road. The easement and my property are therefore elevated. When leaving my house, my driveway is relatively level until it gets to about 40 feet from the road, then it takes a steep downturn where the hill was cut away in the other direction to join my elevated property to the sunken road. So, if I were to walk west to east along the easement following the power lines, I'd be atop the hill with the sunken road to my left and my house to my right. Where my driveway bisects the easement, I'd fall maybe 6 feet just about straight down and would have to climb back up on the other side of my driveway, then I could continue walking unimpeded to my neighbor's pole in her front yard (still with the road to one side and the houses to the other side).

I do not know if it's coincidence or design that the driveway hill is completely contained within the easement. The utilities cannot currently access the easement from my driveway because of the steep hillsides on either side of my driveway inside of the easement. When they turn into my driveway, they cross the 30' width of the easement to climb the hill. At the top of the hill, the easement is now just behind them. So they have to make a Uturn from my driveway, through my yard to get to the pole within the easement.

I've learned from this thread and others within the forum that the utilities are really only allowed within the easement - by passing through it and turning around in my yard, they are trespassing. Which, as long as they didn't cause damage, I never really cared about. But now I need a fence and driveway gate (or, at the very least, a driveway gate). Which, if I install them, will retrict their activities to the easement only. Which, as described, they won't be able to get to from my driveway without driving up a 6 foot cliff, nor will they be able to access from the state road row without driving up a 15 foot cliff. The way the hill slopes off to the west, they would have direct access to the easement via my neighbor's driveway, but I think that's too much to ask.

So it looks like I'm back to my original question: is it within my right to install the driveway gate outside the easement, even if it impedes the utilities' access to the easement? If it's not within my right, then, effectively, their easement has been increased to whatever amount of additional land they need to jockey their trucks around my yard. Which further resticts my ability to use and enjoy my property.

What it comes down to is bad planning by whichever powers decided the layout of the lot. I'm not sure how they could have done this differently, but they've effectively cut off access to the easment from the driveway by carving through a hillside to install said driveway. At any rate, I'm stuck with what I have and must work around it. I'd like to fence in my property and I'd like to do so using as much of it as possible. I already have to locate my fence 30' inside my property line to allow for the easement (which I'm perfectly OK with - I knew that from the beginning). But if I have to move the fenceline any closer to the house (to allow the utilities to use my front yard as their driveway/parking lot) then the point of a fence is moot. On top of all this, I planted a row of trees outside the easement about 15 years ago and the trees are finally maturing to a good size - can they make me cut down my trees so they can drive through my yard to get back to their easement from my driveway? They do not interfere with the easment, but, once they grow to full size, they will interfere with anybody trying to drive around in my yard.

I've left a message with the electric company's representative and I've also sent an Email. I have not yet heard back. The last time I had a question (I needed to confirm that the easement was, indeed, 30 feet wide with the utility lines as the centerpoint - it is) it took weeks of phone calls and Emails to get a response. So I'm not hopeful that they will return my call or Email anytime soon.

Have you read the document that created the easement? Are you positive it does not include a right to access the easement via your driveway?

I would be certain of that before doing anything with the gate.

correct me if my understanding is incorrect.


starting at the road going up the drive you will cross the easement first before you come to where the gate is to be installed.
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Does the utility easement abut the highway property or easement?