dinglem

How would i go about that please? I was hoping such an issue would have been raised in the reply to my initial mail to the Waterways people yesterday when they sent their map of the land they owned.

I was assuming that because the Waterways people have come back to me with their map showing their boundary along the edge of the water that the land between is therefore not registered to them. Furthermore, the land my grandfather owns actually originally extended a long way further north around the canal, but when he purchased his plot the original land owner sold off two other plots to the north to other parties. They have both subsequently been redeveloped, leaving a 3m or so gap along the canal edge and looking at their title deeds they do not include the strip up to the water either. There is a possibility therefore that the plots of land were sold not including the canal side strip and it could potentially still belong to the house my grandfather owns. I am wondering then, whether should my grandfather manage to extend his claim to include his canalside area, whether he could also extend this to include the strip around to the north as it does not look like this was actually sold on all of those years ago. There are no boundary posts, no fence, which is why i contacted the Waterways people in the first place to get their take on it. I think i need to approach the Land Registry next to check whether that strip is indeed unregistered, and then look at putting in a claim.

Hi all - first post. My grandfather owns a large property which he has owned for around 40 years. He always used to tell us that when he moved in the canal 'was in his garden' and that he eventually had to plant a row of bushes and shrubs to stop people walking along the tow path on the other side of the canal and looking into his garden. I went and checked the boundary a while back and there is indeed no fencing or obvious boundary anywhere. Behind his shrubs is a patch of overgrown bramble. Bit of a mess. I got curious about this recently so today i wrote to the Canal and River Trust for our local area (Midlands) to see if they could indeed confirm where their boundaries lay and furthermore see what might be required to apply for a garden mooring. I kind of did the latter to see what reply they might give (positive or negative) based around my land ownership question. Promptly i received a map dated today and entitled with the house address showing their boundaries, and very clearly showing that their ownership line runs directly along the edge of the water when crossing past my grandfathers property. Immediately to the south there is a bridge which also shows the boundary running along the edge of the water, but for the subsequent property moving further south of the bridge the border immediately jumps out to include the river bank also. The map was accompanied by a nice positive note directing me to the form to apply for a garden mooring. Looking at the deeds to my grandfathers house (albeit crudely drawn in red, seemingly by hand) the boundary for his property has a slight gap away from the edge of the water. Can it be assumed that he does indeed own this strip of land - possibly via adverse possession? - and if not who else could own it? He did sell a strip of land at 90degrees to the canal further north to a neighbour around 20 years ago, but the land he sold is shown on additional title deeds and again this does not extend to the canal side. I am wondering whether the deeds were re-drawn up at that time of sale and were adjusted albeit very slightly to follow the line of the shrubs he planted? It is probably a 2-3m wide strip, which from the map i have been sent today the Waterways do not own or claim to own. I made it quite clear in our email exchange that i wasn't certain and wanted clarification from them if they owned the bank. I am wondering whether it is possible he does indeed own the land right up to the canal and also potentially the additional strip between the canal and the land at 90deg to the canal he sold off, as this small area was clearly not included in the sale title deeds. I would imagine in total it is around 30m of canal length, and there is no way to access this land apart from through his garden. Sorry if such a question has been asked a thousand times before. I am just curious if there might be a mysterious 3rd party who owns the non tow-path side of the canal in certain areas, local authorities and the like? If not - how do we go about claiming the land back, and from whom? Is it just a case of approaching the Land Registry and showing them the Waterways plans and getting the title deeds adjusted accordingly? Hope you can help. Regards Martin.