CLOSING A STREET

Evening Post, Volume CXI, Issue 105, 4 May 1926, Page 12

CLOSING A STREET

THE LEGAL POSITION.

A week ago the Pefcone Borough Council discussed the question of the closing of one of its privately-owned streets and decided that it would raise no objection to the closing of a portion of Nevis street' by Messrs. Odlin and Co., provided that'the firm compensated any of the adjoining property owners who might have rights. Last evening the matter was further discussed on receipt of a full legal opinion from its solicitors, Messrs. Kirk and Harding. The opinion clearly set out that Messrs. Odlin and Co. had no present right to close the street, and that the only way in which such a right could be obtained was for the council to promote legislation to take over the street, and then to obtain an Order-in-Couneil to close it. Then, if the council desired, it could dispose of the land to adjoining owners. The council decided to promote such legislation, to which any of the owners of adjoining property would have the right to object. It is stated that at the present time certain owners of property have raised strong objections to the fencing in of the road, and it is alleged that the objection has taken the form of pulling down the fence. ' Mr. Kirk made it quite clear that though the street is not a public street, the '"council has ao jurisdiction over it at all, yet, haying been for years a de facto road, persons with property abutting on to it have a right of user. In regard to the balance of Nevis street, and also Locky street, it was decided to seek an . empowering. Act to take these over, when they were made 50 feet wide. . It was also decided to promote legislation to gain control over a strip of land on the eastern foreshore, now held by the Government, for the purpose of "puttie utility."