Legal ramifications when driving through private property?

I would say that it's plain old trespassing to start with. Then if any damages are done you have to fix them.

I do not think that he can come after you with a gun though. Even though if it was a regular intrusion he may like to.

The big trap is insurance. Hire car insurance and deposits as well. You may also void and car, caravan/trailer or travel insurance. This can happen no matter where you are and the old "ignorance is not an excuse" thing doesn't let you off. If you even go on a closed road or track in an NP or the back restricted area or a service station or cattle station, the insurance may be voided.

Personally I would have turned around as well.

A trap is a road closed sign that has been moved aside by someone else. It may look like it has been opened but with me Murphy is just around the next corner. So If I see one in the ditch kind of out of the way and it could be understood that the road is open, then without touching the sign I take a photo and continue. Five seconds delay then away.

Depends if the closed Gate was on an Official Road Reserve.

If the gate was on a road reserve then it can not be locked/closed for entry and you would be in your right to move on through as long as you keep to the road reserve, you would not be trespassing. No trespassing does not mean you can not enter the property, unless there is a lock on the gate. You have right of entry to the front door to see the owner, or if you remain on the road reserve.

A gate or grid on a road reserve needs to be licensed and still available for use to all road users (Of course we leave the gate open or closed as we find it).

In saying this there are issues to consider.

Is all the road on the road reserve? This is not always the case and not easy to determine. You would need an accurate DCDB map from DERM to determine this.

I have my local DCDB loaded on to a GPS and I can safely say there are a lot of roads in my area that are not on the official road reserve.

There is a good case to look up and that is Palmerville Station VS Cook Shire Council. The owner of this station locked all His gates as the roads that were used for 100s of years were not actually on the road reserve. This ended up in the Court for Years and why that happened access to these roads was not available and if you did attempt to drive them it was dangerous.

Palmerville to Maytown Road

This issue has now been resolved and resulted in Council placing the roads on the official road reserves and they are open for business.

Cheers Tony

Tony has highlighted a major problem with these crown roads and that is that many are not on their correct alignment. You are therefore traversing someone elses property.

Now if these roads, and I have several on my property, are not part of the general road system of the area then, as a property owner, you are entitled to lock the gate if you so wish but must somehow maintain access for the relevant authorities who may have to access that section of Crown road for whatever reason. It sometimes requires those relevant authorities to provide a lock so that it can be locked through our lock as in the case of our front gate.

Further to this in NSW the State Government has enacted a policy of allowing landholders to purchase these Crown roads where they are not required for access to another property or area. These so called "Paper Roads" still apear on the older maps and may be some current maps if the information has not been updated.

You see the most significant thing is in most cases these paper roads are being rented from the State Govt. by the landholder and they have to pay rent to the Govt. every year for that road unless they fence it out of their property.

Some GPS devices want to take you down these paper roads as well.
They are called paper roads as they only exist on paper. There is no actual physical road. Some also want to take you along private roads also merely because they apear on maps.

As other have said, you need to check your facts before you enter these roads.

The simple rule of thumb is, if you need to go through them ask the property owner. All most of us want is that we know if someone is on our property and that they are bonafide travellers or at least respectful.

There is so much rural crime these days that it is causing paranoia, to some extent, among the farming community. Not only that but some people have no respect for other peoples property that some property owners are saying "Stuff the lot of them" end quote.

If someone was in your back yard without your permission you would feel slighted and downright angry if they were up to no good. We are no different.

On the other hand if someone came to me and asked if they could camp down by the dam provided they left it pretty much as they found it I would not hesitate to say "Yeah, go for you life mate, enjoy." I might even join them for a beer at days end. But then I am not everybody.

Cheers, Bruce.

Private roads may well be on your GPS. The internal track on our 100 acre property is on mine. Despite having come through an open gate where the gravel access roads ends, i have caught people driving down this internal track. They are trespassing, as if they were lost, they can see the house as they come in through the gate and come to it, as people sometimes do and get help to find the person they are looking for. As these days things do go missing from farms, i treat any such intruder who continues on through the second gate with suspicion. They have given excuses such as "But this road continues to xxx where i am going on the map" "Sorry, you cannot get through on this private track" - wanting to add your map reading skills are not good. They even argue :O. Another excuse is that they thought they were some one else's property - like they don't know what their friend's place looks like ~. We don't have many near neighbours and none at all like our bush track access.

We do have public liability insurance, and do not have the right to prevent hawkers and the like coming to our door, short of a locked gate. On my family farm on the Blackwood River, we had to allow access to the river, as below high water mark it is public access property. A gate, maintained track and billabong crossing was provided and maintained by us. Friends and neighbours generally phoned ahead to ask or let us know. This is now no longer used as the sort of community picnics we had are a thing of the past. This sort of access comes at a risk of unauthorised campfires and wildfires as well as those who bring dogs which can chase or damage sheep. These things have happened. Private property is private - respect it or ask permission.

Motherhen

Well, this is all confusing, but thank you for all the feedback.
JS.

Does anyone have knowledge of something called "Queens Way" i think it suggests that the public has right of access for a certain distance along the banks of a watercourse ?

Many road reserves are leased to land owners who may restrict access to the public for any reason The lessee must erect a gate and can padlock the gate if they desire.
I had one for quite some time on a 99 year lease. The lease transfered to the new owner when I sold the property.
Ozjohn.

Can't help with the legalities, however was that you guys camped at Mt Werong on Sunday morning.
I drove in about 10am to air up after camping at Yerranderie for the night.

We have found signage and/or gates erected by mining companies far more intimidating, and they may be on roads we are following from a public road map. I understand the safety issues and needs to close mine sites to the public.

One was Tallering Peak north of Mullewa. We went to a natural 'pound' once used for holding cattle on a stock droving route and the map showed the road continuing to Tallering Peak as a lookout. Not far past the pound was a gate with No Entry signs from the mining company. I suggested to my husband we open the gate and travel only as far as we could find somewhere to turn around. We were quite some distance from the mining activities. He would not do so, and did a 33 point turn with the small caravan on the narrow track, feeling quite annoyed that there was no warning of the gate nor any place to turn around once reaching it.

Near Kalgoorlie we took a drive to the east, and the road (Bulong Road) we planned return from this loop now had intimidating signs of no entry from a mining company. There was no gate, and although there was mining activity off to either side of the public road. Another tourist said take it anyway - it is a public road. Both parties travelled without incident.

Motherhen