Cottage owner 'last man standing' on road blocked by neighbour
When Erick Fritsch arrived in Nova Scotia for his annual summer vacation, he was greeted by an unfamiliar sight: a steel gate across the road leading to his cottage, and a sign identifying the route as "Pugsley Logging Road".
Fritsch has owned a summer cottage on the road , which is officially called Little York Road, since 1997, and has never seen a gate there before this year.
"Much to my surprise, I come here and I find that I'm the last property owner up the hill on Little York Road. I'm feeling like the last man standing there," he told CBC's Information Morning.
Records show a public road
Little York Road is a public road, according to the Nova Scotia Land Registry, and Fritsch said the deed that he obtained 20 years ago when he bought the cottage shows the property is on a public road
Fritsch isn't the only person who's been blocked from using the road. In the Fall of 2015, another resident said his family had been forced to move their home on Little York Road, after Arthur Pugsley put logging trucks and heavy machinery in the way.
White said emergency vehicles and school buses could not get down the road, leaving his family no choice but to abandon their home.
Technicians blocked
Fritsch said Pugsley has given him a key for the gate, but people Fritsch had hired to work on his cottage were obstructed by Pugsley, including a Bell Aliant technician who'd come to repair Fritsch's phone line.
Fritsch himself spoke with Information Morning from a location that was not his cottage, since his phone connection hadn't been fully repaired.
Another person who'd come to do work on Fritsch's property found herself locked in by the gate, and had to ask Pugsley to let her out.
'I reserve the right to study it'
Fritsch said Nova Scotia's Deputy Minister of Transportation Paul LaFleche showed up unexpectedly at his cottage on Tuesday.
"He came to inform me of the situation with Little York Road, and to tell me that they are having a forensic study underway, and actually have had it for more than a year, which is close to completion."
Fritsch said he was told the study seems to demonstrate that part of the road is public and part is Pugsley's private road, but he wants to see it to assess the situation himself.
"I first want to see the forensic study, and I reserve the right to study it."
The transportation department and Pugsley have declined to comment.
Petition demands the road be kept public
In the meantime, Fritsch is participating in a public protest happening at 1 p.m. on Saturday at the Five Islands lighthouse.
He said he intends to let participants in the protest know that they have his support.
"I'll tell them that I consider them all my friends and they're invited to come to a party that I'm going to throw just after that, to be able to speak about what the plans are."
A petition has been started, calling on the provincial government to keep Little York Road a public road.
