N.Y. Canal Law § 60
Whenever the commissioner of transportation shall deem it necessary to discontinue or alter any part of a county road or town highway because of its interference with the proper location or construction of any work on the canal system either of improvment, maintance, or repair he shall direct such discontinuance or alteration to be made and file in the office of the clerk of the county or town in which such road or highway is situate, an accurate description of the part of such road or highway so discontinued and of the one laid out anew. From the time of filing such description such road or highway shall be considered so altered. The use of such old road or highway shall not be discontinued until the new road or highway is declared open for public use by the commissioner of transportation, and a certificate to such effect filed in the office of the clerk of the county or town in which said road or highway is located. Every alteration made on any public road located upon the canal system before the first day of January, nineteen hundred and thirty-nine shall be deemed valid in law from the time of such alteration.
N.Y. Canal Law § 60