Legal Question in Civil Litigation in California

I live on a hillside with my neighbor's drive way appx. 5 feet higher than my uphill retaining wall. All along the drive way there are low growing Juniper shrubs that were probably planted about 54 years ago by the developer of my housing area. Over the years the Junipers have grown down the hillside and have put down some shallow roots while the main stem was clearly still on my neighbors property. They are what is holding the hillside in place during the rainy season. My neighbor desires to remove the old Junipers all along his driveway as they are old and not very attractive. If he removes the main stem of the Junipers and leaves only the few shallow rooted branches they will die and I will loose the plants that]

hold my hillside in place. I am afraid of water run off damage unless I completely replant the hillside which is mostly soft sandstone rock

(where nothing has grown for 50 years) or build another 20K retaining wall higher on the hill. Do I have any financial recourse or cost sharing with my neighbor if he removes all of admittedly his Junipers due the the damage it will do to my property?


Asked on 7/19/16, 1:19 pm

1 Answer from Attorneys

My initial thought is why do you think the junipers are holding the hillside? If the hillside didn't come down when the junipers were too young to hold anything, why would it come down now? Junipers provide erosion control, but not hill holding power according to any sources I know of.

On the legal issue, though, the basic rule is that an up hill neighbor must not discharge water or mud runoff onto your property, but they are not responsible for natural flow. So the question becomes whether their driveway or other man-made aspects of their property will collect and discharge water (and maybe mud once the junipers are gone) onto your property, or would the only flow be the same or less than if there were no man-made structures uphill from you. My guess is their driveway is angled or has drainage such that it doesn't discharge onto the slope in question, since it would be pretty bad design for it to do so. If it doesn't, any slope protection you want is on you. If it, or any other aspect of his hardscape or drainage, DOES discharge onto that slope, then the neighbor is responsible for replacing the junipers with structural work or plantings to prevent that water (or mud) from coming down onto your property.

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Answered on 7/19/16, 1:35 pm


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