Can I gate or fence across an easement?
Often yes, on a private farm road. Virginia lets the owner of land under a private way put gates or cattle guards across it when required to protect livestock, and its easement interference statute leaves fences, cattle guards and gates adjacent to the easement out of the objects it restricts. The deed's terms still come first, and a gate that unreasonably interferes with the right of way can be challenged.
Is the gate there for livestock, on a way that is not a public road?
At the fence line a cattle farmer needs two things at once: stock kept in the pasture, and a neighbor's way kept open. Virginia's fence law answers that conflict in one sentence, and the sentence has two conditions.
Any owner of property on which there is a road or way, not a public road, a highway, a street, or an alley, over which an easement exists for ingress and egress of others may place cattle guards or gates across such way when required for the protection of livestock.
Va. Code 55.1-2808
Is the way private?
The section covers a road or way that is not a public road, a highway, a street or an alley, where others hold an easement to come and go.
Is the gate required to protect livestock?
The permission is tied to that purpose. A gate hung for some other reason does not have this section behind it. Va. Code 33.2-110 separately lets a landowner put gates across a private road or right-of-way where fences reach it on each side, unless a contract provides otherwise, and the deed and the general interference rule below apply either way.
If both answers are yes
The owner of the land may place gates or cattle guards across the way. The easement holder then has an option of his own, in the next section.
The statutes call the neighbor's right an easement of right-of-way, a private way across another's land; the term is defined in the right of way glossary entry. Where the shared road is also a subdivision or private access road with its own recorded agreement, that agreement is part of the picture, and the full life of such a road is in private roads and maintenance agreements.
The easement holder may trade the gate for a cattle guard, at his own expense
A gate across a road you drive every day is a stop, a latch and a stop again. The next section of the Code gives the person holding the easement a way around that.
Under Va. Code 55.1-2809, any person having an easement of right-of-way across another's land may, at his own expense, replace a gate on it with a substantial cattle guard sufficient to turn livestock. Two conditions come with that choice.
- The easement holder maintains the cattle guard and keeps it at all times in sufficient condition to turn livestock.
- If the gate being replaced is needed or used for moving equipment or animals through, the cattle guard has to be built to allow that passage, or, if the easement is wide enough, it may be placed beside the gate instead.
Such a cattle guard shall be deemed a lawful gate and not an interference with such easement.
Va. Code 55.1-2809
So the two sections speak to both sides of a familiar farm-road dispute. The landowner may protect his stock with a gate, and the neighbor who objects to opening it may pay to replace it with a guard that does the same job.
What the deed says, then whether the gate unreasonably interferes
Neither statute above overrides the easement's own terms. A deed can grant a way that must be kept open, and no general rule about gates reads that language for you.
Va. Code 55.1-305 sets the general balance. Unless the easement's terms provide otherwise, the owner of the burdened land may not engage in an activity or keep objects on or immediately next to the easement that unreasonably interfere with the holder's enjoyment of it, and the holder may not use it in a way not reasonably consistent with the uses the grant contemplated. On fences and gates the section is specific.
For the purposes of this section, "object" does not include any fence, electric fence, cattle guard, gate, or division fence adjacent to such easement
Va. Code 55.1-305
That exclusion is not a promise that any gate is lawful. The Supreme Court of Virginia, in Thibault Enterprises, LLC v. Yost in 2026, told courts to examine the deed's language for the easement's purpose and the parties' intent first, and then to evaluate whether the landowner's actions unreasonably interfere with the easement. The landowner keeps the right to use his land in any way that does not unreasonably interfere with the use granted. The same opinion describes an earlier case in which a fence that kept easement holders from two-thirds of the easement was held impermissible.
Vehicles, brush, plantings and walls, and the rules of use a landowner may set, are covered in whether a neighbor can block your easement.
A fence that closes off a grave needs a gate or other way through, and a line fence is its own subject
Two fences on farm ground are governed by rules that have nothing to do with a neighbor's road.
The first is a fence around or across the way to a family burial ground. Virginia's cemetery access statute, Va. Code 57-27.1, says no landowner may erect a wall, fence or other structure that prevents ingress and egress to the cemetery or grave unless it has a gate or other means for the persons the statute names to get through. Who those persons are, and what the owner may set about the timing and route of their visits, is covered in selling land with a family cemetery.
The second is the division fence on the line between two farms, which the Code treats as a matter between adjoining owners, with its own rules, rather than as an easement question. Who builds it and who pays is laid out in boundary disputes, the basics. Terms used on this page, from easement to deed, are defined in the land and real estate glossary.
A gate or cattle guard on a shared farm road?
Send the county and tax map number, and Lowell will pull the recorded easement for that road before the farm goes on the market, so its wording can reach your attorney early. No cost, no obligation.
Got it. Thank you.
We'll be in touch shortly with an honest read.
Questions this raises
Who has to keep up a cattle guard that replaced a gate on a farm road?
The easement holder. Under Va. Code 55.1-2809, the person who replaces a gate with a cattle guard does it at his own expense, maintains it, and is responsible for keeping it at all times in sufficient condition to turn livestock. Once built to the statute, the cattle guard is deemed a lawful gate and not an interference with the easement.
Does the livestock gate statute cover a public road?
No. Va. Code 55.1-2808 applies to a road or way that is not a public road, a highway, a street or an alley, where others hold an easement for ingress and egress. A gate across a public road, highway, street or alley gets no support from that section. The permission it gives on a private way is also tied to one purpose: the gate has to be required for the protection of livestock.
Can a gate across a shared farm road be kept locked?
The livestock gate and cattle guard statutes, Va. Code 55.1-2808 and 55.1-2809, speak of placing gates to protect livestock and say nothing about locks. Whether a locked gate is allowed turns on the recorded easement's terms and on whether it unreasonably interferes with the holder's use, the test the Supreme Court of Virginia applies. That is an attorney's reading of the deed and, if it comes to it, a court's decision.
Where this page's facts come from
Every rule, office and figure above traces to one of these. Rules change; check the office before you act on one.
- Va. Code 55.1-2808 and 55.1-2809, cattle guards and gates across rights-of-way (Title 55.1, Chapter 28) Virginia General Assembly
- Va. Code 33.2-110, gates across private roads Virginia General Assembly
- Va. Code 55.1-305, enjoyment of easement Virginia General Assembly
- Va. Code 57-27.1, access to cemeteries located on private property Virginia General Assembly
- Thibault Enterprises, LLC v. Yost (April 9, 2026) Supreme Court of Virginia