Construction crews in Rouzan will begin laying asphalt later this week on a disputed servitude that connects two properties surrounded by the Traditional Neighborhood Development—but not part of the TND—with the development and ultimately Glasgow Avenue.
Charles Landry—who, along with John Engquist, acquired Rouzan earlier this year from its original developer Tommy Spinosa—says site work is underway to prepare the gravel access road to be paved over with black top as soon as Thursday.
“We’re doing this at our own expense, even though we are not required to by the court,” Landry says. “We think this will be a significant improvement.”
The location of the servitude has been at issue for nearly a decade. The Welch and Hoover families, whose properties are surrounded by Rouzan but are not part of the TND, sued Spinosa in 2008 for blocking their original access to Glasgow by building houses atop the road they used.
In 2017, after years of litigation, the First Circuit Court of Appeals reversed a 2015 District Court ruling and ordered the servitude to be restored. Spinosa, owner of the TND at the time, constructed a new servitude that doesn’t lead directly to Glasgow Avenue but ties into Glasgow via other streets in Rouzan.
Landry, an attorney and specialist in real estate law, says the new access road satisfies the court’s judgment and, once paved, will be better for users than what they had before.
But an attorney for the Welch and Hoover families says the new road in no way satisfies the First Circuit ruling.
“This is not what the Court of Appeals ordered,” says attorney Alex St. Amant. “The Court of Appeals told them to restore the servitude, not to build another servitude.”
St. Amant says his clients will only be satisfied once the original servitude is restored, which would mean tearing down several houses in Rouzan. He has taken the matter back to the First Circuit, which has set a March 12 due date for briefs.
Landry says he respects the Welch and Hoover’s right to appeal but says, “We believe the court was correct that Tommy had the right to relocate the road to a location that did not impair their access.”
Paving the road, he says, “is our effort to get all this behind us and move forward.”
