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New development cannot generally remove public rights of way. They may divert them, but even this is difficult, subject to public consultation, and should be sc
by globular-toast 3y ago
New development cannot generally remove public rights of way. They may divert them, but even this is difficult, subject to public consultation, and should be scrutinised by local councils. It's very difficult to remove a public right of way completely in the UK. It does happen occasionally, but it's very unlikely that's what's happening in London.
What's more likely is you are taking advantage of new access opened up by developments that were previously dockyards or something that could never be traversed by the public. Landowners are very careful to make it clear they are not public rights of way lest they actually do become public rights of way, which could have an impact on the value of the land.
As a member of the public, you should campaign for these de facto ways to get made into public rights of way. That is something that can, and should, happen.
- quietbritishjim 3y agoThe parent comment never used the phrase "right of way" so your comment does not contradict them, though to me it seems to have a tone of disagreement.
- globular-toast 3y ago"It's now effectively impossible to not use private land to get around the area." That implies public rights of way were removed. I fail to see any other interpretation of this. If there were never public rights of way then it was always impossible to get around the area. Unless they mean they themselves live on one of these developments and must therefore traverse private land to get back on to a public highway. If so, ability to access the public highway is protected and living on such a development should always grant rights (and responsibilities) over use of the land (any decent solicitor would flag this up if not).
- quietbritishjim 3y agoI think their meaning was something closer to your last paragraph - there was nothing interesting there before so it didn't matter that there was no public right of way. But now there are things on private land that they are interested in. If you're thrown off a private road on your way to a pizza restaurant that's on it, you wouldn't have the same rights you're talking about for owners (or leaseholders) of properties on the private estate.