A new "Leelanau Trail" battle appears to be brewing – now involving the Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians and property owners in northern Suttons Bay Township.

The owners of several properties near the tribe’s Peshawbestown reservation last month filed suit in federal court seeking to block a move by the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) to place portions of a former railroad corridor along M-22 into federal trust status for the tribe – meaning that the land would essentially become part of the reservation and not subject to local zoning regulations.

The 100-foot-wide corridor totals 22.5 acres of land that traverses a number of properties just south of the reservation – in most cases crossing driveways and landscaped areas comprising residential front yards.

The corridor was used for many decades by railroad companies operating a line between Traverse City and Northport. In the 1990s the Leelanau Trail Association sought to purchase much of the railroad corridor between Traverse City and Suttons Bay for use as a recreational trail.

Court battles between the trail association, local property owners and local municipalities dragged on for years in Circuit Court with the latest case, involving Bingham Township, finally resolved following hearings by the Michigan Supreme Court in 2001.

In one of the longest-running and most contentious court cases, the trail association sued a number of property owners to prove that the association actually owned the corridor, and that the property had not “reverted” to local property owners after the railroad companies abandoned the corridor.

Among those sued in the 1996 case was Suttons Bay property owner Judy Belanger, who is now one of the plaintiffs in the federal court case filed last month against the BIA and its parent agency, the federal Department of Interior.

Belanger could not be reached for comment. The attorney representing her and other property owners suing the federal agencies, William Davison of Traverse City, did not return a reporter’s phone call.

Tribal attorney William Rastetter said his assumption was that Belanger “has duped her neighbors into a fruitless (and unnecessary, expensive) battle” with the federal government. “Apparently she ‘has a thing’ about the railroad corridor,” Rastetter added.

Rastetter said that both the state and federal courts have concluded that the 100-foot former railroad corridor was not simply an easement that may have reverted upon abandonment of the railroad service, but is owned in “fee title” – in this case by the tribe.

The Tribal Council has already agreed to provide permanent easements for the plaintiffs’ driveways, Rastetter said, “but it wouldn’t surprise me if she (Belanger) has misrepresented the situation to others.”

The Grand Traverse Band has long been a staunch supporter of the Leelanau Trail and other trails in the region, according to Bob Otwell, executive director of Traverse Area Recreation and Transportation (TART) Trails, Inc. The tribe helped fund the campaign for paving much of the Leelanau Trail up to the Village of Suttons Bay; TART now has easements to extend the trail as far north as Dumas Road in Suttons Bay Township.

“We’ve had discussions with the tribe in the past about trails on the reservation and about connecting them with the Leelanau Trail,” Otwell said. “Of course, the route north has not been worked out, but it would roughly parallel M-22.”

Trail officials have noted in the past that the former railroad corridors are being preserved not just for bicyclists, cross-country skiers and hikers – but for other possible modes of transportation in the future. They point out that, 100 years ago, no one fully envisioned the decline of railroads and the rise of automobiles.

Otwell said the tribe is not only a supporter of the Leelanau Trail, but was also instrumental in helping to preserve the TART trail leading roughly west from Traverse City toward the tribe’s Turtle Creek Casino in Grand Traverse County’s Whitewater Township.

“You never know what will happen five to 10 years from now,” Otwell said, “And it’s nice to have those corridors available.”

The current lawsuit is not expected to have an impact on the Leelanau Trail as it is now configured.