The Record How a tourist train seized a coast, laid out from the public file.

What the case turns on

The Skunk Train is a tourist railroad on the Mendocino coast. To take land it does not own, a railroad has to be a public utility, a common carrier that holds itself out to serve the public. In 2020 the Mendocino Railway moved to seize a private parcel in Willits by eminent domain. A trial judge looked at a business running almost entirely on excursion tickets and ruled it was not a public utility, so it could not take the land. In late 2025 a state appeals court reversed, holding that public-utility status turns on the character of the service, not its size. While that question moved through the courts, the company assembled a former Georgia-Pacific mill site and a long run of the Fort Bragg waterfront.

The sequence

1. 1885C.R. Johnson opens the Fort Bragg sawmill and lays out the town. The original company town is born; it incorporates in 1889.
2. 2002Georgia-Pacific closes its Fort Bragg mill, idling roughly 272 acres of oceanfront.
3. February 2004The California Western Railroad, the historic Skunk Train operator, is in Chapter 11 bankruptcy. A federal bankruptcy court authorizes the sale of its assets out of the estate.N.D. Cal. Bankruptcy, sale order Feb. 11, 2004
4. April 2004Sierra Railroad (the Hart family) buys the line out of that bankruptcy estate, forms the Mendocino Railway, and takes the land under all 40 miles of track.STB Finance Docket FD 34465; deeds 2004-08199 / 08200
5. 2018 – 2019The first downtown and mill parcels are acquired, including a Skunk-line parcel from Chris Baldo and the Georgia-Pacific mill-site parcels.Recorder Doc. 2018-04239; 2019-07030
6. December 2020The railway files an eminent-domain action to take John Meyer's 20-acre parcel in Willits, citing a planned transloading facility.Doc. 2020-17872
7. November 2021The railway completes its roughly 272-acre mill-site purchase.
8. August 2022The railway files its own federal suit against Fort Bragg and the Coastal Commission, asserting federal preemption.
9. April 2023Judge Jeanine Nadel rules for Meyer: at roughly 90% excursion revenue the railroad is not a public utility and cannot take the land. About $265,000 in fees is awarded to the landowner.Mendocino Railway v. Meyer, Mendocino Cnty. Super. Ct., Apr. 19, 2023
10. August 2024The Ninth Circuit affirms dismissal of the railway's federal suit on abstention grounds, without reaching the preemption question.Mendocino Railway v. Ainsworth, No. 23-15857
11. September 2025The Surface Transportation Board confirms the railway is a Class III common carrier despite minimal freight.STB Finance Docket FD 36868
12. December 2025 – January 2026A state appeals court reverses the Meyer ruling: public-utility status turns on the character of service, not its extent. Days later, parcels are deeded into a new holding company.Mendocino Railway v. Meyer, No. A168497 (Cal. Ct. App.)
13. February 2026The STB denies the petition to abandon the Fort Bragg line; the corridor stays in the national rail network.STB AB 1305 (Sub-No. 1)
14. April 2026A railway holding company buys the Union Lumber Company Store from a family trust. The loop closes where it began.Doc. 2026-03605

Press & further reading

A note on sources

Check it yourself

You do not have to take a skunk's word for any of this. The whole point is that you can pull the files.

The fight is still live, in public bodies that meet in public: the City of Fort Bragg, the California Coastal Commission, and the Great Redwood Trail Agency. Their agendas and records are open. Read them.