The City plans to transfer a municipal alley to all of its bordering residents (half of them owning property fronting street X and, the other half, on street Y).
A citizen deemed the situation unfair because, according to him, this alley had been formed from pieces of land that used to belong to owners of street X, who had been forced to transfer them to the City, in 1965: in his opinion, therefore, all the alley should only be offered to the owners of street X.
Our investigation showed that the City had acquired these lots before any residential land was sold to citizens, to build their homes. Over time, owners had encroached on this alley with different installations or constructions, but these encroachments were illegal and did not confer any ownership or acquired right.
Thus, the OdM concluded that the City could apply its usual procedure for alley transfers as provided in Addendum C of the Charter of Ville de Montréal, i.e., offering the alley to all the bordering owners, in equity.
