Piers Riley-Smith
Piers has a varied planning, environment, licensing and highways practice.
Piers is ranked in Chambers and Partners 2023 where Clients have said:
" Piers Riley-Smith is a strong planning junior”
“An enthusiastic and excellent communicator as an advocate, and within the professional team.”
Piers is ranked in the Legal 500 as a “Rising Star” and is noted as being “approachable and fully committed to the job in hand, providing good advice and giving a very positive impression to clients.’
Planning and Environment
He is regularly instructed by local authorities, developers and the wider public in planning inquiries. He has also been instructed by both local authorities and developers at local plan and neighborhood plan exams. He appears in the High Court and Court of Appeal on behalf of local authorities, and private companies or developers, and local resident groups. He also accepts pro bono briefs from the Environmental Law Foundation, and he has appeared successfully in the High Court for the ELF. He has also practiced on the Isle of Man on behalf of the Government.
Piers has considerable expertise in statutory nuisance. He has appeared in the Magistrates Court obtaining Abatement Orders under the Environmental Protection Act and has successfully appeared in the High Court in precedent setting cases on noise nuisance and hypersensitivity.
Highways
His highway practice has ranged from resisting a s.37 complaint against the public adoption of a highway, to working on a case involving the operation of a s.56 notice relating to the inadequate drainage of the highway, and to appearing at public rights of way and highway CPO public inquiries. This has included appearing for the Order Making Authority on a s.118B Order Inquiry to extinguish a footpath running through school grounds. Piers has appeared at Transport and Work Act public inquiries. Piers often works with local resident groups seeking declarations as to the extent of a highway and has also worked for a local authority in obtaining a relatively rare highway injunction against trespass on the highway. Piers has considerable experience in dealing with Traffic Regulation Orders. This experience ranges from drafting TROs for local authorities, objecting to them for third parties, and challenging them successfully in the High Court. Piers also advises on issues arising out of village green applications. Piers was recently appointed the assistant editor of the Encyclopedia of Highway Law and Practice – the leading practitioner text on highway law.
Compulsory Purchase
Piers has worked for both local authorities and objectors on Compulsory Purchase Orders. This has included helping local authorities put in place proper systems for bringing forward CPOs (from preparing to make the Order all the way to implementing a confirmed Order) and also appearing at CPO inquires, and dealing with the resulting compensation and References to the Upper Tribunal (Lands Chamber) for both claimants and local authorities. This has included successfully confirming CPOs under the Town and Country Planning Act 1990, Housing Act 1985 and Highway Act 1980. Piers has experience leading teams in compensation mediation including settling multi-million-pound compensation claims.
Piers is qualified to accept Public Access work.
Practice Areas
Panel
- Contributing Author
Qualified Year
- 2016
Experience
- Richard Buxton Solicitors (2016 - 2017)
Membership
- Compulsory Purchase Association
- Environmental Law Foundation
11 Contributions by Piers Riley-Smith
PRACTICE NOTES
Civil remedies for highway obstructions: local highway authority duties, statutory notices, urgent removals and injunctions under the Highways Act 1980 (England and Wales)
This Practice Note sets out the civil mechanisms available to a local highway authority for addressing highway obstructions. It explains what amounts to an obstruction and summarises the authority’s statutory powers and duties in dealing with them. Criminal powers are excluded, being considered in Practice Note: Local authority powers to manage highway obstructions—criminal offences. The guidance is suitable for authorities outside London. Much will also be pertinent to London authorities, but certain provisions mentioned below—such as sections 130A–130D of the Highways Act 1980 (HiA 1980)—do not apply in London. London authorities should separately verify whether the powers described below are available to them.
What is an obstruction?
There is neither an exhaustive list nor a single statutory definition. A broad characterisation, drawn from Lord Evershed in Trevett v Lee, is something that, whether permanently or for a time, removes all or part of a highway from public use. To that broad description, one may add the element that the removal is without lawful authority...
Local Government
PRACTICE NOTES
Compelling highway, footpath and bridge repairs (including drains and structures): magistrates' court applications under section 56 Highways Act 1980 (England and Wales)
This Practice Note sets out the statutory entitlement allowing a member of the public to insist that the highway authority puts a highway back into repair again. It explains the process laid down by section 56 of the Highways Act 1980 (HiA 1980), via the magistrates’ court, for deciding whether a highway is out of repair. It does not address establishing that a way is a highway, nor that the highway authority bears responsibility for its upkeep, where that is in dispute. It also extends to drains, structures, public footpaths and bridges.
Duty of the highway authority
A highway is a route over which any member of the public enjoys a right to pass and repass, free from obstruction, throughout every season of the year. Under HiA 1980, s 41, the highway authority is obliged to maintain the highway. The authority must keep the road in a condition of repair such that it can be traversed safely at all times of the year.
Right to complain
Where a member of the public believes that a highway is out of repair, HiA 1980, s 56 permits any member of the public (the complainant) to seek an order from a magistrates' court...
Local Government
PRACTICE NOTES
Highway Bridges and Tunnels in England and Wales: Public Rights, Maintenance Responsibilities and Key Statutes, Including Tolls, Bridge Orders over Navigable Waters, Boundary Arrangements and Footbridges
This Practice Note sets out the principal highways law matters relating to bridges and tunnels—namely the public’s entitlement to pass and re‑pass across bridges or through tunnels, and who carries responsibility for their maintenance. It outlines the four categories of highway bridge and explains, for each, where the maintenance duty falls, with particular reference to the Highways Act 1980 (HiA 1980) and the Transport Act 1968 (TrA 1968). It also summarises relevant legislation that is specific to toll bridges and tolled tunnels, new bridges across navigable water, bridges across boundaries, and footbridges.
The main highways law issues concerning bridges and tunnels are as to the:
rights of the public to pass and re‑pass across bridges or through tunnels
maintenance liability for them
The HiA 1980 definitions of a bridge and a tunnel provide little practical assistance...
Local Government
PRACTICE NOTES
Highway land in England and Wales: statutory vesting versus full ownership, extent of the authority's interest ('top two spits'), and acquisition powers, with case law and Highways Act 1980
This Practice Note outlines the distinction between highway land that is only vested in the highway authority and highway land that is owned outright by the authority. It highlights leading cases and statutes, notably the Highways Act 1980 (HiA 1980) and the Local Government Act 1929 (LGA 1929), and clarifies that, where land is merely vested, the authority’s proprietary interest extends physically to the upper two spade-depths of the relevant land, or to such depth as is required for the construction and maintenance of the highway, including associated drains. Whilst that form of vested ownership will usually suffice, highway authorities may purchase freehold estates in land under the HiA 1980 for the creation of new or improved highways. Some highway land is only vested in the highway authority, whereas other highway land belongs entirely to the authority...
Vested land
The key to understanding the ownership of highway land is rooted in its historical development...
Local Government
PRACTICE NOTES
Highway maintenance liability in England and Wales: private (tenure, enclosure, prescription) and public responsibilities, section 38 adoption and commuted sums, List of Streets, and highway authority duties
Highways not maintainable
There exist a handful of highways for which no party bears any duty to maintain them at all in law. This arises only in very unusual cases where a landowner has dedicated a route as a highway, yet it has neither been adopted nor had responsibility for upkeep defined. In such a case, many wrongly assume the maker or dedicator of the highway becomes liable for maintenance and repair. That assumption is false. Where a way has been dedicated as a highway but not adopted, no one is responsible for its maintenance, as the dedicator is under no duty to maintain or repair it. Every other highway is maintained either at public expense, by a private company, or by one or more private individuals who, in most instances, prove to be frontagers or owners of the subsoil.
Highways privately maintainable
The usual example of a privately maintainable highway is a road newly constructed under section 38 of the Highways Act 1980 (HiA 1980) agreement. Until a newly adopted road has been open for roughly 12 months, the developer typically remains responsible for its maintenance...
Local Government
PRACTICE NOTES
Highway maintenance: duty to repair, inspection systems, extraordinary traffic and section 58 defence under the Highways Act 1980 (England and Wales)
This Practice Note
This Practice Note sets out that the standard of highway maintenance required is determined by the level of expected ordinary traffic on the route concerned. It further explains that a person injured by a danger on a highway may sue the highway authority in negligence, and that the authority has a statutory defence under the Highways Act 1980 (HiA 1980) if it can show it exercised reasonable care. It also notes that, at common law, the obligation is to keep the highway in a reasonable condition rather than to improve it. The authority must carry out routine inspections of the highway surface and run a system for incoming reports of damage; however, the duty to keep the highway in repair does not extend to damage caused by extraordinary traffic. A highway authority is under a duty to ‘maintain the highway’...
Local Government
PRACTICE NOTES
Highway obstructions: criminal offences, charging considerations and enforcement options for local highway authorities (England and Wales)
This Practice Note outlines the criminal offences a local highway authority may rely on when prosecuting matters relating to highway obstructions. It does not consider civil powers, which are dealt with in Practice Note: Local authority powers to manage highway obstructions—civil remedies.
What is an obstruction?
There is no exhaustive list, nor a single statutory definition, of an obstruction. In Trevett v Lee, Lord Evershed broadly characterised it as something that, either temporarily or permanently, takes all or part of the highway out of public use. To that broad understanding, one can add the element of acting without lawful authority. A highway authority can, however, authorise or grant a licence for what would otherwise be an unlawful obstruction by issuing permits, for example:
builders’ skips
scaffolding
temporary deposit of building materials
See Practice Note: Highways obstructions—building works, scaffolding and skips...
Local Government
PRACTICE NOTES
Highways in England and Wales: public rights, classifications by traffic and maintenance, and definitions of key types
This Practice Note
This Practice Note concerns the public’s legal entitlement to use vehicles, to ride a horse, or to drive animals along most highways. It outlines that the commonest ways of categorising highways are by the traffic allowed (for example, a footpath or bridleway) and by the maintaining authority (for example, a classified road or GLA road). It also provides an alphabetical list with descriptions of the principal highway types in England and Wales.
The essential public right over a highway is for any person to pass and re‑pass along its length. On the majority of highways—though not every one—there is, in addition, a lawful right to use vehicular transport and/or to ride a horse and/or to drive animals from one place to another.
The most usual classifications of highways into types are by permitted traffic and by maintenance authority. The classification of a highway by its permitted traffic has two sources:
at common law, the dedication (or deemed dedication) of a new highway can be limited to rights for specified traffic, ie as a footpath, as a bridleway or as a carriageway
...
Local Government
PRACTICE NOTES
Procedure for modifying the Definitive Map: applications, evidence and order confirmation (England and Wales)
This Practice Note
This Practice Note outlines the statutory obligation on the relevant authority, under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 (WCA 1981), to maintain the Definitive Map in continual review. It sets out the circumstances that may justify a modification, and indicates who will commonly seek a modification order. It also describes how to make a Definitive Map Modification Order (DMMO), highlighting the proper form, the supporting material required, and the decision-making steps taken by the Definitive Map authority. The subsequent formal steps after a DMMO are also covered, identifying which authority must carry out each task. The purpose of the Definitive Map and Statement (‘Definitive Map’) of public rights of way, and allied matters, is that it is conclusive. Yet, despite its definitive status, it is not immutable. The local highway authority (the County Council or a Unitary District Council) has an ongoing duty to keep the Definitive Map under constant review. Reasons to alter the Definitive Map include:
that a public right of way has arisen,
that a route has been lawfully changed or closed,
or that an entry ought never to have appeared at all on the Map...
Local Government
PRACTICE NOTES
Public highways in England and Wales: legal definition, vesting and subsoil ownership, creation and adoption routes, maintenance duties, stopping up and diversion powers, and the role of National Highways
Meaning of ‘highway’
At its widest, a highway is a way—being a defined route such as a road, bridleway or footpath—over which the public may pass and re-pass. ‘Highway’ and ‘public right of way’ are often treated as the same, though ‘highway’ more usually denotes the physical corridor rather than the entitlement itself. For instance, a route used by motor vehicles would typically be described as a ‘highway’ rather than a ‘right of way’.
Right of passage
Once a route is a highway, the public acquire a right to go to and fro along it. That right is limited by the highway’s type: footpaths and pavements permit travel on foot; bridleways allow use on horseback; and vehicular roads cater for movement with or without vehicles.
Classes of highway
a carriageway, including a byway open to all traffic (for use on foot, horse, cycle, motorised and non-motorised vehicles)
a bridleway (for use on foot, horse and cycle)
a footpath (for use on foot and mobility vehicles)
Ownership of highway
Several interests can exist in the...
Planning
PRACTICE NOTES
Street works and statutory undertakers: NRSWA 1991 duties, permits, notices, lane rental, permit schemes and common law liability (England and Wales)
This Practice Note outlines the procedure for statutory undertakers and holders of street works licences to use the highway for utility works and apparatus under the statutory framework in the New Roads and Street Works Act 1991 (NRSWA 1991) and other enabling legislation. It explains who qualifies as statutory undertakers and sets out the duty of care owed, both under statute and at common law, to other highway users.
Street works at common law
At common law, interfering with the surface of a highway amounts to a nuisance. In the nineteenth century, utility companies seeking to route underground pipes and cables along highways—though these were the most obvious corridors—were, in the absence of statutory powers, restrained by the courts from placing their apparatus. The Sheffield Gas and Cambridge Gas cases illustrate this principle.
Street works—liability in negligence
Even where legislation authorises interference with, or use of, the highway for utility works and apparatus, statutory undertakers and those holding street works licences continue to owe a duty of care to other highway users...
Local Government
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