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Castel considers how to deal with Ruette des Touillets wall

Castel Parish has the option of enacting a 100-year-old law to remove a wall that has led to a road in the parish being shut for the past two and a half years.

A number of large concrete blocks were placed in the road to prop up the bulging wall, closing the narrow road to cars, and have remained there ever since.
A number of large concrete blocks were placed in the road to prop up the bulging wall, closing the narrow road to cars, and have remained there ever since. / Guernsey Press

Ruette de Touillets, near the parish-owned Fairfield, first shut in August 2023 after the wall – part of Les Touillets, the manor house which borders much of the road – started to lean out over the roadway.

A number of large concrete blocks were placed in the road to prop up the bulging wall, closing the narrow road to cars, and have remained there ever since.

The continued closure of the road was brought up at this week’s parish meeting, with one parishoner saying he had been told that the owner had three months to solve the problem, or the parish would remove the support propping up the wall.

Senior constable Kelvin Hudson said he could not comment on the rumour but the wall certainly did fall under a dangerous wall act from 1919.

‘The constables do have the power to go and demolish the wall at the owner’s expense and reopen the road,’ he said.

‘That is clearly a nuclear option, which we’re trying to avoid. We’re trying to get Traffic & Highways, who are responsible for the road, and the property owner to agree on a resolution of the matter.’

Mr Hudson acknowledged that the road had been closed for far too long.

‘In this particular case, there is a ongoing disagreement between Traffic & Highway Services and the property owner,’ he said.

‘Over the last few months, there have been trial holes dug on both the roadside and on the property side and water levels have been measured. I believe there will be a further meeting between Traffic & Highways, the property owners and the constables, with a view to reviewing the data that has been collected and then progressing when the property owner is next in the island.’

Around 20 parishioners attended the meeting which agreed the church accounts and parish remede.

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