This 13-year-old case between a Cotentin municipality and SNCF Réseau was judged on appeal

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For 13 years, the thorny affair of the “Trotte-Boeuf aqueduct” ruins the life of the municipality de Couville (Manche), engaged in a standoff with SNCF Réseau.

A new episode took place this Thursday December 19, 2024 in front of the cour administrative d’appel from Nantes (Loire-Atlantique).

SNCF Réseau demands 1.1 million euros

SNCF Réseau demands 1.1 million euros to the commune of Couville de reimbursement of work of replacement of a nozzle which passes under the railway tracks of the Paris-Cherbourg line in order to allow the flow of water the Trotte-Boeuf.

An insurmountable sum for a municipality of 1 249 habitants whose annual budget is €820,000. In November 2023the administrative court of Caen (Calvados) had rejected the request of SNCF Réseau. But the railway company appealed the decision.

The SNCF had noted from 2010 a ” degradation of the metal nozzle” which allowed the deviation of the watercourse. She then launched a “ dangerous alert » to the prefect a first time, before repeating 2013 and in 2016.

In the absence of any work to replace the nozzle being carried out by the municipality, the company had carried it out itself, November 14, 2017 to November 12, 2018.

After two years of negotiationsSNCF Réseau finally issued an “injunction” to the town hall of Couville and the prefect – supported by the Ministry of Ecological Transition – to pay 1.1 million euros to reimburse the cost of the work. But this was refused by two “implicit” decisions dated June 15, 2021.

The public rapporteur disavows SNCF Réseau

The Caen administrative court then disavowed the company, in a judgment dated November 24, 2023: it was “up to it” to maintain the nozzle itself, they estimated. the first judges.

The good condition of the culvert – which is “covered with an embankment” and “dates from the Second World War” – is in fact of a certain importance: it is “the built extension of the railway aqueduct”, “necessarily participates in its proper functioning for the flow of water” and “guarantees the solidity of the structure” was recalled during the hearing.

This Thursday, during the appeal trial, the public rapporteur recommended that the judges confirm the decision of the Caen court : the nozzle constitutes “an inseparable accessory” of the aqueduct, he also believes.

The lawyer of SNCF Réseau contested the “accessory” nature of this nozzle.

If you retain it, then in this case we could apply this reasoning to many buildings and structures. The approach adopted by the administrative court and the public rapporteur of the notion of accessory is too flexible.

Deliberated in about a month

On the other hand, the lawyer for the commune of Couville, from the Juriadis firm in Caen, obviously said she “totally subscribes” to the conclusions of the magistratet. “If there is an aqueduct, it’s because there is a railway. The aqueduct and the culvert must be considered as a single work,” she explained.

The prefect of Manche was neither present nor represented by a lawyer.

The Nantes Administrative Court of Appeal, which has reserved its decision, will deliver its judgment in approximately a month.

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