'Preserved Right of Way'

B

Boscod

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I have a long established public right of way running along the boundary of one of my fields. It enters and exits my land. About ten years the county council included the entire right of way in the county development plan. When they mapped the piece crossing my land they show it in an adjoining field, not the one it's actually in. It would suit me if the path followed this 'preserved' route rather than the actual one. The degree of change from it's current position would not be significant, ranging from 3 to 10 metres, repositioning it on the other side of a wall.
How easy / difficult would it be to effect this change?
 
This looks like a classical mapping error.

I think that the safest view is that the old right of way is still preserved for the time being. I say for the time being as I do not know what formal legal agreement, if any, you (or your predecessors in title) may have entered into with the council about the public right of way.

If you say nothing about the "new" right of way and allow it to continue unchallenged you may well be deemed to have acquiesced to it after a certain number of years.

Therefore, you could conceivably end up with two extant rights of way over your land !

Talk to the council. It would be better to regularise the matter for the avoidance of doubt and potential trouble in to the future e.g if you wanted to convey some or all of your land in the future or if there was an accident and there was a dispute about responsibility for the accident locus.

Better still, you should talk to your solicitor first so that they can point out any potential problems having had the benefit of perusing the relevant title documents to your property.
 
Thanks DD for your reply.
I'm not aware of an formal legal agreement being ever put in place. No burden is shown on the deeds concerning this, however the 'old' path is identified on the Land Registry maps. The 'new' right of way is not presently being used, it appears on paper only. I agreed I should discuss with a solicitor, however I just wanted to get some high level feedback first before I take that course of action.
Rgds
 
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Just a passing additional thought.

If the property is old some transactions may have taken place and been memorialised in the Registry of Deeds but the document was not filed with the deeds bundle that you have. A search in the Registry of Deeds might be needed to establish evidence of any such transaction having taken place but your solicitor will know what to do.
 
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