A ?shrinking? road in St. George?s has a long-time resident concerned that his home will soon become landlocked.

James (Buddy) Wade has been living on Bourne Drive in St. George?s for more than 30 years ? after buying the waterside property from John Bourne.

The fact that the asphalt road which leads up to his home has been slowly growing narrower over the years hardly raised an eyebrow as there were few homes lining the road which is bordered by the St. George?s Golf Club.

But the situation worsened over the past year when the neighbouring development, he claims, took some 12 feet off the public road.

Mr. Wade said the original road was never ?finished? as such, but pointing to the original plans of the area, he said the road has always been dead straight and about 20 foot wide ? from his front door all the way to the end of the golf course where it makes a turn to the right.

However with the new development, the road now runs at an angle and in some places is less than four feet wide.

Since his house is the last one on the dead end road, Mr. Wade said he was concerned that his neighbour?s continued development ?into the road? will soon cut off all access he has to his home.

Mr. Wade claimed the Department of Planning was to blame because they never told the developer he was in the wrong.

?I told the guy that his property?s boundary wall and his driveway were built at an angle and about 12 feet into the road and he said he knew, but that Planning had approved these plans so he wasn?t going to change them,? he said.

He said the developer claimed Planning had given him 20 feet to build on, but he (Mr. Wade) was not sure if that meant from the edge of the house, or from the edge of the actual property ? which in essence meant that he was given permission to build ?over the road? if he so desired.

He said as the only access to his house, should the road disappear, he would find himself in dire straits.

?As it is I?m having a hard time driving up to my property now with the road being so narrow and should the golf course decide to put up a boundary wall, I won?t be able to get to my property at all and will have to get my neighbours? written permission to get to my own house ... and I ain?t doing that,? he said.

Once again referring to the plans, Mr. Wade insisted the road should be 20 feet wide, but because residents on Bourne Drive had allowed their lawns to ?grow over? the edge of the road which was also ?crumbled? away at the edges, this was no longer the case.

?When the development started next door, the hole that was dug removed another six or so feet off the road in the process and continued to fall in every time it rained, taking bits of the road with it,? he said.

Despite complaining to the Department of Planning, including a written complaint, he said nothing ever came of it.

He said he was told even before development started that if the developer builds a wall or a driveway where he should not have, then he (the developer) would have to fix it at his own expense.

?But to let him build this far out ? if he has to pull it down now, it will cost him a lot of money,? he said, adding that if Planning had made the mistake then surely they should pay to fix the problem.

Mr. Wade added that Planning had to know what was going on because they were supposed to inspect building sites, but that was obviously not the case.

He said since the house was almost finished he knew that nothing would be done about the building ?violation?.

?I know they won?t do anything about the road now, but to accept that my house will soon be landlocked is something I won?t do.?

Director of Planning, Rudolph Hollis said this week that the property had been the topic of debate some time ago, but said these issues, as far as he knew, had been resolved.

He said he did not know if this was a ?new issue? or not, but said he was more than happy to send an inspector to Bourne Drive to investigate.