We can obtain the widening of an insufficient public road

Invoking the principle of a right to open up, the Court of Cassation authorized an individual to impose on his neighbors the widening of their plots.

According to the Court's case law, any plot is considered landlocked when it does not have sufficient access to the public highway, taking into account the needs caused by the use made of it and taking into account the topography of the premises.

This time, the owner of a commercial property complained of not finding a tenant because the width of the cul-de-sac leading to his premises was insufficient. He therefore demanded that the residents of the dead end undergo a widening to the intersection with a larger street.

Being isolated implies difficulties in accessing a public road, these residents replied, and this is not the case since these premises are on the edge of the cul-de-sac which is a public road. They added that the problem was part of the urban plan and that they did not have to offer what this owner had not obtained from the town hall.

However, the Court of Cassation ruled them wrong. The needs of this owner, taking into account the commercial destination of his plot, and the state of the access road, can lead to the conclusion that it is landlocked, she ruled. Which would force others to undergo enlargement.

In this matter, the judges have already explained, notably in October 2013, that the existence of an insufficient path was not enough to exclude enclosure. Agricultural land must be accessible to agricultural machinery for the needs of normal operations, they said. In 2011, they judged that a house without a road for emergency vehicles was landlocked. But conversely, in December 2017, they declared the pedestrian access to a small agricultural land in a steep area sufficient.

(Cass. Civil 3, 23.3.2022, K 20-23.342).