right of way built on

S

superhigh90

Guest
To whom it may concern

We ( the in laws ) have land with a house in the middle of a field say 15 acres just out side of a town , there was a sale of land in front of us say 10 acres . (never owned by us ) . but one time was all one , big manor .

Now a local company has bought and built on this land ( in front) and destroyed the original right of way and water pipe.

On our side the original stone bridge over the dike is still there also the road to the old house ,
this leads into their commercial development and onto the main road.
on their side they put up a fence 12ft high ,
dug up the water pipe coming from a water tower on the other side of the main road through their land and into ours for use, dating back, to feed cows in those times and the house ( i guess ), the water tower dated back say 1928 ish ? and the same for the road
also they built a very LARGE building ON where the old road/right of way existed .


Our deeds/site map show the right of way , but they are playing dumb .... they submitted a map for planning which had no right of way on it ?? and got the planning and have built lots of commercial buildings on it since ..


what do we do ???
who do we contact ?? papers ??? who??
have we rights or not ??
 
Were planning applications put in the paper, was there no notice on the site in advance of the development, did you not see the building work starting, were there any planning hearings? How did it get to this advanced stage apparently without you taking any action or paying attention?
 
Yes, I agree with Mathepac.. it seems you might be a little late complaining now.. I can't see the council or whoever re-instating the right of way if buildings would have to be knocked. You should really have complained when the map with no right of way was submitted to planning, at that stage I believe you would have been sucessful.
 
The other respondents comments seem appropriate and the relevant issues boil down to two main ones


1. Planning; -

You appear not to have engaged with the planning process - is this the case?

Why did you not inform the local authority by lodging an Observation [usually €20] during the first five weeks of the planning application period?


2. Legal; -

Are you now claiming that your rights have been affected?

Why did you not take legal advice/action before this?


Moving forward; -

Regardless of this, if you can prove you are the beneficiary of either the right of way or the water supply, and these have been affected to your detriment, you may have a case in law against the developer.

But be careful, the developer may not be "playing" dumb.


I give two examples of how this might be so below; -

Instance #1

What follows is my recollection of a case from over a decade ago, so I wil name no names and I may be subject to correction on this, but my recollection is as follows; -

A developer was sold land bounded by an old stone wall, through which he intended to gain access from a rear mews lane/small road. The developer claimed the vendor knew this.

It turned out that the wall was not owned by the vendor, resulting in a significant delay and costs for the developer until the owner could be dealt with to buy the wall and access rights. The developer sued the vendor and his solicitor.

There was no case held against the vendor - I think this was because he claimed that he made no representations about owning the wall, or did not know about the wall, regardless of what he knew about the buyers intent.

The solicitor's office was held to blame and costs awarded against them. The case turned on a question in requisitions on title, wherein the solicitor confirmed there were no burdens on the land. I think he may hve been held to have had a duty of care to the buyer.

Anyway, the developer in this case was an innocent party.


Instance #2

You'd be surprised what can be shown on old maps. I know of a piece of land where the surveyed area was significantly less that the claimed aread on the deed. The owner walked the land to determine the boundaries.

It turned out that notwithstanding what was shown on the deed, another party had a portion of the land within their site and a deed to back it up.

It became clear that both deeds were around the same age, and the subsequent partition was not registered on one, but was on the other. There was no question of legal redress, since the one party had the land fenced in and maintained in sole ownership for over 50 years.


This is the Free Advice Bit; -

I think you need to talk to a barrister experienced in cases centring on the law of easements and profits á prendre, a solicitor experienced in conveyancing and an architect experienced in reviewing old title maps before you go any further.

You should then ask them to establish all the facts bearing in mind the two examples I have given you above.

I think you should then write directly to the developer, through your solicitor, putting your case, assuming you have one to prosecute.

I don't think you should make any allegations of impropriety on anyone's part in a public forum.

Even if what you say is true, such publicity about a case that may end up on court can sometimes be relied on by a defendant to suggest to the court that a far hearing involving a jury may be impossible.

I hope this helps you resolve this issue successfully :)
 
wow thanks
will take it all on board
but again thanks for the reply
 
the story with the maps is,
the map that we have has the old road on it and also the copy of there deeds from the planning office has it on it
yet it was an OS map that was supplyed for planning .
i tell you it all stinks
 
If i recall correctly from my legal days, there is a long standing precedent that holds that a right of way, once established, cannot be extinguished without express permission from the grantee.

There have been may attempts down through the years to argue that by not using the right of way, the grantee has implicitly surrendered it, but the courts seem unwilling to entertain this argument.

It would be my opinion that if you can prove that you in fact had a right of way over the land in question, this must remain.

There have been a number of cases involving family wills where a dwelling was left to one child and all the land around it to another - there is an implied right of way inferred by the courts in this instance as it is imperative that occupiers have access to their property.

hope this is of some help
 
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