James L. Shields

Following a trial in which the plaintiffs obtained declaratory relief confirming that their lot boundaries extended to the water’s edge and that a corporate defendant had no interest in a disputed strip of land, the court addressed a further dispute concerning the scope of a previously awarded costs order.

The plaintiffs sought to extend the costs award beyond the corporate defendant to several individual defendants and a non‑party.

The court found that the litigation and evidentiary record concerned only the dispute between the plaintiffs and the corporate defendant, and that no evidence or argument had been directed at the individual defendants.

Concluding that those individuals were effectively nominal parties and that the litigation was necessitated solely by the corporate defendant’s position, the court declined to impose costs against them.

The costs order was confirmed to apply only against the corporate defendant.

Following a seven‑day civil trial in which the plaintiffs obtained declaratory relief, the court was required to determine the scale and quantum of costs.

The plaintiffs argued that a pre‑trial Offer to Settle triggered Rule 49.10 of the Rules of Civil Procedure and sought partial indemnity costs to the date of the offer and substantial indemnity costs thereafter.

The court held that the offer did not clearly correspond to the judgment obtained and therefore did not justify elevated costs.

Costs were fixed on a partial indemnity basis, with the court reducing the claimed hours as excessive and applying a regional benchmark of approximately 60 percent of counsel’s actual hourly rates.

Waterfront property owners sought a declaration that their subdivision lots extended to the water’s edge of the Ottawa River despite a strip of land shown between the lots and the shoreline on a 1931 registered plan.

The defendants, successors in title to the original subdividers, claimed ownership of the strip and argued the plan intentionally reserved the land.

The court found a latent ambiguity in the subdivision plan and admitted extrinsic evidence to determine the intention of the original subdividers.

After reviewing historical surveying practices, expert evidence, and surrounding circumstances, the court concluded the rectilinear boundary on the plan represented an approximation of the high-water mark and that the subdividers believed the intervening land was public.

As the Crown patent extended to the water’s edge and there was no intention to reserve the strip, the lots were held to extend to the water’s edge.