Cutting Them Off at the Pass : Beach access: Lawsuit seeks exclusive use of pathway from Coast Highway for residents of South Laguna condominium complex.

For years, a wooded path trailed inconspicuously to the beach between the private, gated communities of Blue Lagoon and Lagunita.

That path now has become the subject a lawsuit brought by Blue Lagoon, a condominium complex, against Lagunita, a housing development, and dozens of other residents in the city. The suit seeks to establish exclusive use of the path for residents of Blue Lagoon.

But the result of the case may be, instead, that a pocket of relatively inaccessible beach will be opened to the public.

Carolen Sadler, a defendant in the lawsuit, said the path “belongs to us, and we want everyone to have access to it, not just homeowners of Blue Lagoon.”

In November, the Blue Lagoon Community Assn. filed the lawsuit after some area residents demanded use of the path to get to the beach, according to the association’s lawyer, Tracy H. Ettinghoff. The lawsuit, filed in Superior Court, demanded a “quiet title” to a 20-foot-wide path that snakes from Pacific Coast Highway through Blue Lagoon and Lagunita and ends at the sand.

“Quiet title” means that the court would obliterate from the records any previous ownership of a property.

With Blue Lagoon as the sole owner, that community could bar anyone else from the path.

Blue Lagoon residents have for years made no secret of how they value their beachfront privacy and have staunchly resisted every effort to open the path to the public.

Blue Lagoon claimed in the lawsuit that its members have rightful use of the property because they have been using the beach access exclusively for the past five years and because previous owners had “abandoned” the path for 20 years.

The trail’s access was first recorded in 1953 when Paul and Maria Esslinger granted usage rights to the Myers-Laguna Co., according to court records. Through the years, the Esslingers and Myers-Laguna granted use of the trail to people who owned certain properties. Most of the properties today belong to defendants in the lawsuit.

Blue Lagoon now contends that the Esslingers had no legal right in 1953 to deed over user rights, according to court records.

Darren Esslinger, 27, an heir to the Esslingers who were named as defendants, on Monday disputed that claim.

“They don’t have a case against us at all because we legally have a right” to use the path, said Esslinger.

As to Blue Lagoon’s claim that the property has been “abandoned” for 20 years, Esslinger said that until last year he had a key to the lock that opens the fence to the path and had used it often to get to the beach.

Some defendants in the lawsuit were not aware that they had easement rights until Blue Lagoon sued them. If they do not respond to the lawsuit, they will lose their right to use the trail, which would go to Blue Lagoon by default.

Many have said they will not fight the lawsuit because of high court costs. But about 20 said they are not willing just to relinquish their rights to the path. Instead, they want to deed them to the city of Laguna Beach, so that the path could become accessible to the public.

The city is currently studying the feasibility of accepting those transfers, and will present a report to the City Council next Tuesday.

If the city decided to accept the deed, the trail would become public. The area’s gated communities would probably protest that action.