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Permalink Reply by Donald Smith on July 17, 2017 at 13:14

Note that LBEnfield Calendar shows the next Southgate Green Area Forum as at Beaumont Centre Cannon Hill on Thursday 20th July at 7pm

Link HERE

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Permalink Reply by Matthew Kitching on July 17, 2017 at 20:24

Curious as to who the freeholder is (Enfield LBC?) and what the interest would be to a developer.  The only reasoning I can come up with is fairly negative, i.e. once acquired the developer would enter into negotiations with owners regarding payment to allow access to the rear of their properties, previously taken for granted.  They might also wait for adjacent properties to come onto the market in order to create larger plots for development.  Perhaps I've become a bit cynical about how developers view our area.  I guess there's always a possibility that there won't be any interest.  If I owned a house that backed onto one of these rear 'roadways' I'd probably check my deeds.

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Permalink Reply by Donald Smith on July 18, 2017 at 15:37

Adoption of a roadway makes it a public highway maintable at public expense but does not mean that the local authority owns the underlying land

Attachments:

• New Southgate-A History.pdf, 98 KB

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Permalink Reply by Hutch Woodward on July 21, 2017 at 20:25

So who owns this land that the council now see fit to sell to the highest bidder then?

Are you saying the council have adopted the land and can now sell it - incidentally they don't maintain it other than putting up a few gates.

The Stoneham road alley thats between Shrewsbury road and Maidstone road was in the Enfield independent or advertiser a few years ago) due to fly tipping and the council claimed it had nothing to do with them so fitted gates (to most of the other alley ways as well) to deal with the problem. now they think they can sell them?

I always thought properties have a right to access (if you have a garage) and those alley ways have been there best part of 112 years since the houses were built.

 

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Permalink Reply by Matthew Kitching on July 21, 2017 at 20:44

Hutch, I think the message is don't assume LBE own the land. It could be TfL, for example.  Anyone who owns an affected property should probably check the Land Registry.  This should/would have been done at the point of purchase of a property.  In terms of 'grandfather rights' it is possible to demonstrate that access rights to rear access land are established but there is a process that needs to be gone through to do this and if it is a general common access that may be tricky.

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Permalink Reply by Donald Smith on July 25, 2017 at 15:15

The roads were sold at auction for £600 see http://www.barnettross.co.uk/property.php?id=4871172

I previously wrote:

Adoption of a roadway makes it a public highway maintable at public expense but does not mean that the local authority owns the underlying land

Hutch Woodward writes: 

The Stoneham road alley thats between Shrewsbury road and Maidstone road was in the Enfield independent or advertiser a few years ago) due to fly tipping and the council claimed it had nothing to do with them so fitted gates (to most of the other alley ways as well) to deal with the problem. now they think they can sell them?

I always thought properties have a right to access (if you have a garage) and those alley ways have been there best part of 112 years since the houses were built.

The Local authority claim was probably correct. The process known as "alley gating" was an attempt by the local authority to reduce dumping ..... it does not demonstrate ownership!

Adoption is a specific process, for say a public footpath. Access includes access on foot and or vehcles

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Permalink Reply by Donald Smith on July 25, 2017 at 17:13

Having purchased the access to the rear of properties shown on the map for £600 (+auction fees) the new owner has been  facilitated opportunities but also crystalises landlord liabilities in terms of health and safety.

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