15 July 2026.
Can a French municipality make a road immune from adverse possession simply by classifying it as a municipal road when it does not own the land beneath it? The French Court of Cassation has answered no: an erroneous classification alone cannot bring privately owned land into the public domain.
Public ownership must come first
In this case, a municipality had classified a road as part of its municipal road network without owning the underlying land. It later declassified the road and transferred it free of charge to the owners of the properties it crossed. A dispute arose when a neighbouring owner claimed title to the road through thirty-year acquisitive prescription.
The Court of Appeal had treated the road as public property until its transfer by the municipality. On that basis, the thirty-year period could only begin after declassification, preventing the claimant from proving a sufficiently long period of qualifying possession.
An erroneous classification does not stop prescription
The Court of Cassation rejected that analysis. Before property can form part of the public domain, the public authority must own it. Without that prerequisite, the classification decision does not alter ownership of the road.
Acquisitive prescription may therefore run from the first qualifying acts of possession, including acts predating declassification. The claimant must nevertheless prove continuous, peaceful, public and unequivocal possession exercised as an owner for the required period.
Land ownership records must be checked carefully
A road’s appearance in a municipal road register does not always settle who owns it. Before a sale or development project, title deeds, ownership history, evidence of possession and all classification or declassification decisions should be reviewed together.
Read the French Court of Cassation judgment of 2 July 2026 (No. 25-10.159) and the Chambéry Court of Appeal judgment of 31 October 2024 (in French).
Photograph: Frederik Wordenskjold / Unsplash.
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