Scaffolding on Right of Way

dottiec

BarelySentientAI said:

dottiec said:

swingaloo said:

I cant help but think that you are getting far more involved than you have a right to be. Its fine being concerned about your road but the rest of the builder/property owners plans are noting to do with you really.  Why would he have to consult you on  how involved the renovation will be. 

Mainly because he needs my permission and the residents need reassurance that they will be able to enter and exit the site in their vehicles.   I have already given him permission to park a skip on the only spare piece of land available, mainly to avoid him putting it on the main which would cause a further hazard.  Ok he can get a Court Order but in my view our entrance is so restricted he would be instructed to either use a mobile scaffold unit, or find another way of placing the scaffold which may be much more expensive.  I have no idea how he intends to place the scaffolding in order to not obstruct access, so I have asked to meet him on site and hopefully iron these things out.  

I am happy to admit over thinking things if that turns out to be the case.  

I shall try and upload a photo which I think will help.

What swingaloo is saying (I think) is that you appeared to be wanting complete consultation about the scope and scale of the refurbishment - worrying about the overall plans when you "had no idea how involved the renovation would be" is way out of scope for your involvement.

Asking how he intends to place the scaffolding is completely fine, but demanding management plans, site risk assessments for anything other than the scaffolding/access, details of parking arrangements for salon clients etc is overstepping and at risk of causing unnecessary conflict.

I've never mentioned his clients.  I thought when he asked to park the skip it would be a short term thing.  Had he explained his overall intentions, then I could have given more thought to it.   I am not interested in his internal refurbishment or parking for his clientele only external alterations that have an effect on residents' access and everyone's safety.  I am suggesting a simple written explanation and scaffold plan as word of mouth doesn't seem to work and when someone gets injured (hopefully not) at least one of us has tried to put safety first.

stuhse

user1977 said:

stuhse said:

You have little to worry about; the laws of the land have evolved through the centuries such that as the owner of land which has a right of way you are not held responsible for people on that land or that lands maintenance to any particular standard.   For clarity you are the 'servient owner',  all the people with rights of way over that land are 'dominant owners'.

No, "dominant owners" are the owners of any properties which have a right of way. Your links are about the obligations of maintenance where e.g. a house has a right of way up a track owned by the neighbouring farmer, and whether the farmer has an obligation to the owners of the house to fix the track. Nothing to do with claims for slips and trips by third parties.

Agreed i could have worded it slightly better thankyou for providing the greater clarity of who the people with rights of way are ie the owners of the properties that have the rights..

The links are i believe are relevant...a successful claim for a slip or trip could only be made if negligence can be shown. Negligence for a slip/trip would most likley be due to lack of maintenance and that claim would be against the persons resonponsible for that maintenance- they are intrisically linked . Laws around rights of way are not different because its a farmers track. It is simply land with right of way- the same laws apply. Subject to specific wording in the deeds the common law position is the OP as servient owner has no overriding responsibility for maintenance...all the dominant owners share it equally/proportionately too.    Third parties such as postmen entering the land do so just as any postman or delivery driver walks or drives up the drive of a soley owned property like the majority of people own. I dont believe the majority of householders have any special extra insurance to cover visitors to their properties .  

In this situation we are not talking about a lack of mainteance claim but a claim associated with building work on a business premises. The CDM regs therefore apply. My understanding is the person who wants to put scaffold up needs to seek the permission of the land (servient) owner and the dominant owners (who have a legal interest in the land) to agree what restrictions they are prepared to live with for a few weeks (if any) and it may be appropriate that money changes hands for the inconvenience. Its probably better to negotiate and agree something than saying no, as the person needing the works done would then move to the neighbouring land act and as i understand it succeed in enforcing access in the situation described here.  People who buy properties with shared accesses are best accepting there will need to be some give and take from time to time, otherwise they should avoid buying those types of properties. It is good that the servient owner is concerned about safety implications of erecting a scaffold , but any incident associated with the renovation works would almost certainly sit first with beauty saloon owner who is obliged under the CDM regs to employee competent people to carry out the works who are then  considered the expert in a situation like this. 

dottiec

stuhse said:

user1977 said:

stuhse said:

You have little to worry about; the laws of the land have evolved through the centuries such that as the owner of land which has a right of way you are not held responsible for people on that land or that lands maintenance to any particular standard.   For clarity you are the 'servient owner',  all the people with rights of way over that land are 'dominant owners'.

No, "dominant owners" are the owners of any properties which have a right of way. Your links are about the obligations of maintenance where e.g. a house has a right of way up a track owned by the neighbouring farmer, and whether the farmer has an obligation to the owners of the house to fix the track. Nothing to do with claims for slips and trips by third parties.

Agreed i could have worded it slightly better thankyou for providing the greater clarity of who the people with rights of way are ie the owners of the properties that have the rights..

The links are i believe are relevant...a successful claim for a slip or trip could only be made if negligence can be shown. Negligence for a slip/trip would most likley be due to lack of maintenance and that claim would be against the persons resonponsible for that maintenance- they are intrisically linked . Laws around rights of way are not different because its a farmers track. It is simply land with right of way- the same laws apply. Subject to specific wording in the deeds the common law position is the OP as servient owner has no overriding responsibility for maintenance...all the dominant owners share it equally/proportionately too.    Third parties such as postmen entering the land do so just as any postman or delivery driver walks or drives up the drive of a soley owned property like the majority of people own. I dont believe the majority of householders have any special extra insurance to cover visitors to their properties .  

In this situation we are not talking about a lack of mainteance claim but a claim associated with building work on a business premises. The CDM regs therefore apply. My understanding is the person who wants to put scaffold up needs to seek the permission of the land (servient) owner and the dominant owners (who have a legal interest in the land) to agree what restrictions they are prepared to live with for a few weeks (if any) and it may be appropriate that money changes hands for the inconvenience. Its probably better to negotiate and agree something than saying no, as the person needing the works done would then move to the neighbouring land act and as i understand it succeed in enforcing access in the situation described here.  People who buy properties with shared accesses are best accepting there will need to be some give and take from time to time, otherwise they should avoid buying those types of properties. It is good that the servient owner is concerned about safety implications of erecting a scaffold , but any incident associated with the renovation works would almost certainly sit first with beauty saloon owner who is obliged under the CDM regs to employee competent people to carry out the works who are then  considered the expert in a situation like this. 

Thank you.  I was aware of the servient and dominant positions but your email has clarified my position.  I still feel I should at least  to ensure all safety precautions will be taken before the scaffolding goes up, rather than doing nothing, there being an incident and then everyone saying "well, it's not my fault guv".   I honestly think the builder is doing his best but is not great with the detail which provides reassurance. 

BarelySentientAI

stuhse said:

user1977 said:

stuhse said:

You have little to worry about; the laws of the land have evolved through the centuries such that as the owner of land which has a right of way you are not held responsible for people on that land or that lands maintenance to any particular standard.   For clarity you are the 'servient owner',  all the people with rights of way over that land are 'dominant owners'.

No, "dominant owners" are the owners of any properties which have a right of way. Your links are about the obligations of maintenance where e.g. a house has a right of way up a track owned by the neighbouring farmer, and whether the farmer has an obligation to the owners of the house to fix the track. Nothing to do with claims for slips and trips by third parties.

Third parties such as postmen entering the land do so just as any postman or delivery driver walks or drives up the drive of a soley owned property like the majority of people own. I dont believe the majority of householders have any special extra insurance to cover visitors to their properties .  

That's what the public liability insurance part of their home insurance covers.  And the type of insurance the OP identified they didn't have and was considering buying.  "Special" but not "extra" in most cases.

stuhse said:

user1977 said:

stuhse said:

You have little to worry about; the laws of the land have evolved through the centuries such that as the owner of land which has a right of way you are not held responsible for people on that land or that lands maintenance to any particular standard.   For clarity you are the 'servient owner',  all the people with rights of way over that land are 'dominant owners'.

No, "dominant owners" are the owners of any properties which have a right of way. Your links are about the obligations of maintenance where e.g. a house has a right of way up a track owned by the neighbouring farmer, and whether the farmer has an obligation to the owners of the house to fix the track. Nothing to do with claims for slips and trips by third parties.

In this situation we are not talking about a lack of mainteance claim but a claim associated with building work on a business premises. 

Are we?  The original claim-related part of the concern was mainly about "I don't have public liability insurance if the scaffolder trips over and sues me".  Nothing to do with the builder's own insurance, any possible claims against the building work, the business premises, or the contractors.

The possible restriction of access is a different matter, and not a claim at all.

Section62

BarelySentientAI said:

dottiec said:

swingaloo said:

I cant help but think that you are getting far more involved than you have a right to be. Its fine being concerned about your road but the rest of the builder/property owners plans are noting to do with you really.  Why would he have to consult you on  how involved the renovation will be. 

Mainly because he needs my permission and the residents need reassurance that they will be able to enter and exit the site in their vehicles.   I have already given him permission to park a skip on the only spare piece of land available, mainly to avoid him putting it on the main which would cause a further hazard.  Ok he can get a Court Order but in my view our entrance is so restricted he would be instructed to either use a mobile scaffold unit, or find another way of placing the scaffold which may be much more expensive.  I have no idea how he intends to place the scaffolding in order to not obstruct access, so I have asked to meet him on site and hopefully iron these things out.  

I am happy to admit over thinking things if that turns out to be the case.  

I shall try and upload a photo which I think will help.

What swingaloo is saying (I think) is that you appeared to be wanting complete consultation about the scope and scale of the refurbishment - worrying about the overall plans when you "had no idea how involved the renovation would be" is way out of scope for your involvement.

Asking how he intends to place the scaffolding is completely fine, but demanding management plans, site risk assessments for anything other than the scaffolding/access, details of parking arrangements for salon clients etc is overstepping and at risk of causing unnecessary conflict.

In the circumstances I'd disagree.  The scope and scale of the refurbishment is relevant to the length of time the scaffold (and skip) will be present, and whilst the OP cannot expect "complete consultation", these issues are reasonably within the OP's interest.

Parking arrangements (for staff and clients) is also a matter for the OP's concern, being the owner of adjacent land that may get used for flyparking.  However, the time to raise that would have been in the planning process (had there been one) rather than with the builder.

dottiec

Photo taken today.  The porch on the cottage has a walkway to the pavement so the entrance is not as wide as it may seem.  The wooden fence on the left comes into the road at an angle and has within the the gate to the attached cottage, so their exit is straight onto the road.  I can't show more as they are selling the middle cottage and there is a for sale up which would identify where we are.

BarelySentientAI

And it's the right-hand wall on this photograph that they need the scaffolding for?  I guess so from where the skip and blocked up door is.

dottiec

Yes, it's the right hand wall.

dottiec

Section62 said:

dottiec said:

(This is where the problem lies as the builder wants to put up scaffolding along the side of the building sitting on the private road/right of way to work on the roof).

The way you describe the situation it sounds like the builder wants to put up a normal scaffold on the side of the access road they will be working on.  Have they looked at putting up a bridging scaffold - one which is supported on both sides of the road and has a working platform at the higher level? A bridging scaffold involves a loss of usable width on both sides, but wouldn't require vertical poles (known as 'standards') placed in the middle of the road.

A picture probably would help us understand the situation better.

HSE would only be interested if there were unsafe working practices going on, and possibly not until someone had an accident.  It doesn't mean there is no point reporting an unsafe situation though.  A key element of safe working is planning - if the builder hasn't planned their access/working at height arrangements before starting work then there may be other issues as well.

As a general point, scaffolding used where there is moving traffic is vulnerable to being hit by that traffic, which could have tragic consequences for those working on the scaffold.  So a properly designed scaffold should already be taking into account the access road is in use by vehicles and if the access is tight, also taking into account the possibility it may get hit and damaged.

The neighbour may be able to use the Access to Neighbouring Land Act 1992 to be able to make use of the land you own to do work, but it is questionable whether an access order would allow them to block the access road other than on a short-term temporary basis.  Requiring them to obtain an access order may carry other benefits - for example compelling them to indemnify you against damage to the land (and otherwise). If the property is commercial rather than residential you may also have additional rights.  If you think the 'legal' route may be preferable you should speak to a solicitor to get formal professional advice on the right approach to take.

I am attaching a photo.  I am meeting the builder to discuss things on Sunday so it would help if you could give me your opinion on which type of scaffolding would be suitable, if any.  Vehicles do need some manoeuverability to drive onto the main road, particularly when turning left, because of oncoming traffic.  I don't think it is safe to keep the road open with scaffolding up and the residents will not agree to close the road.  We could probably manage as I don't drive now and my son can bike to work but the others all have large SUV type vehicles.  

BarelySentientAI

You might find this document useful - if you haven't already seen it.

https://nasc.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/NASC_SG34-17.pdf