The defendant appealed by case stated against his conviction for driving with excess alcohol. He said that the ‘service road’ on which he had driven was not a ‘road or public place’.
Held: ‘The issue in this case being narrow, help to be derived from the relevant authorities can be summarised as follows. Any road may be regarded as one to which the public has access if the public is there without overcoming physical obstruction or in defiance of a prohibition: Harrison v Hill 1932 JC 13. Whether a place is public will generally be a question of fact and degree: Montgomery v Loney [1959] NI 186. Help may also be derived from asking whether access is meant only for a special class of members of the public, including for example guests of residents, postmen, milkmen and so forth: Harrison; DPP v Planton [2001] EWHC Admin 450. A sign or barrier lends weight to restriction of the area to a special class and thus to its being private but the absence of such is not determinative: Edwards v DPP unreported 10 March 1994 QBD.’
Rafferty DBE J
[2011] EWHC 488 (Admin)
Bailii
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Bowen and Others v Isle of Wight Council ChD 3-Dec-2021
What makes a road a Road?
The Court was asked whether a Road was a ‘road’ for the purposes of the 1984 Act’
Held: It has often been said that the public access mentioned in the definition of ‘road’ must be both actual access and legal or lawful access. However, simple . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Road Traffic
Updated: 10 December 2021; Ref: scu.430372