BING! LIGHT BULB moment!....

Here's a puzzler for you: cave entrance on access land is nearby another cave entrance (locked) on private land. Diggers join the two caves, much of which meanders beneath other land owned by a third party, hence technically there are multiple owners of the passageways.

Who controls access?

And how?

(This might sound like a contrived argumentative circumstance but off the top of my head I can think of at least three sites where something like this could easily happen, if digging is successful).

tut tut Chris, you know that nobody controls the access 'cos cavers have an inalienable right to go where they wish when they wish, it's buried deep in the Universal declaration of Human Rights.

Simples - the land owner owns the land from "Heaven to Hell" so each controls access for the passages under their land.

This is exactly the situation in Easegill. The landowner for the Leck side of the gill does not require permits, so you can enter Link Post and go halfway under the gill through the Wormway at which point there is CNCC rep in a small booth who checks you have a permit to continue.

I made a post in the closed CROW thread quoting US cases that demonstrate the law isn't clear in the US and from some footnotes I found the position in the UK is questionable ( the air/space above your property is only that which you can use) .  If you "occupy" a cave and don't conceal the fact then can you claim adverse possesion of the cave under another's land?.  If you are prepared to do some reading then download the pdf at http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1998381 "The Great Onyx Cave Cases - A Micro-History"

Also, I wasn't aware most homes were sold with mineral rights? Which I assume caves would fall under. Or the airspace above, otherwise I'd like to toll the local flying club.

peterk said:

If you "occupy" a cave and don't conceal the fact then can you claim adverse possession of the cave under another's land?. 

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There is good UK case law that adverse possession can be successfully demonstrated for man-made subsurface voids (= cellars beneath someone else's property).

The sandstone "caves" of Nottingham may contain areas where such scenarios have occurred - but they are man made voids, despite being termed "caves".

My relevant books are packed away but I'm pretty sure that there is UK case law confirming that rights of access and / or drainage beneath other owners land or within other owners' minerals can be gained  by dint of long usage without specific permission, but that that case law has focussed on mines.

Derbyshire might be a fertile area to explore whether similar rights have been gained for natural voids (i.e. caves accessed from mines).

Incidentally, concealing the fact of occupancy doesn't, if I recall correctly, affect adverse possession, the law taking the view that an owner can reasonably be expected to stay abreast of what is happening on or in their property and that it's their loss or risk if they neglect regular inspections (it takes 12 years to gain possessory title through adverse possession - an owner not inspecting property for this length of time would be pretty neglegent).

I wonder if this is pertinent to the case of a WW2 bunker I am aware of, the preservation/restoration of which has been halted for some years as it passes below property, the owner of which objected to the trespass. It seems quite likely. Leaving the matter of "upsetting the neighbours" which is actually an important factor, is there possibly a case to be made for adverse possession, which might permit the project to proceed?

Here's another conundrum:

It's may not be unusual on Mendip to leave digging tools and equipment (buckets etc) in a cave. Some of these digs a quite short, but it's ok at the moment because the digs have gates. If CRoW does apply to caving and these gates have to be removed, what happens to all the digging tools? If left in a short cave or shallow shaft, with no gate, and if the dig is close to a car park (not saying which shaft Im thinking of but you can probably work it out) the contents are going to go walkies. So will it be necessary to remove all the digging tools and paraphernalia between trips to prevent it going missing?

Yes, probably.

And while you're at it, try taking some of the crappy rubble sacks full of spoil with them!

Next question.

This belief that CRoW will result in random removal of gates is totally misguided and a fallacy, please disregard it.

bograt said:

This belief that CRoW will result in random removal of gates is totally misguided and a fallacy, please disregard it.

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hear, hear! 

We have left tools in a dig for three years (we are reluctant diggers) in a cave next to a car park. And not one person has touched them, though the water in there trys to steal our planks. Bloody thieving water, stop moving our planks.

But like others I don't see how CRoW would mean you had to remove your gates anyway, who's going to police it and go round your digs and say hey you can't put a gate here? If there is a legit reason (a shallow shaft) a gate with a Derbyshire key would be allowed for public safety anyway.

The simple thing is ideally if its a cave without a gate already on CRoW land access should be free without need for permits, however if it has been gated for legit reasons such as very delicate or public safety then I see no reason why this will conflict with the act.