Non-federal watercourses subject to the Water Act

The classification of watercourses in the case law(1) is essentially based on the following two criteria: — the presence and permanence of a natural bed originally, distinguishing a watercourse from a canal or a ditch dug by the hand of man but including in the definition a natural stream originally made artificial, subject to proof of this; — the permanence of a sufficient flow for most of the year assessed on a case-by-case basis by the judge on the basis of local climatic and hydrological data and on the basis of presumptions such as the indication of the ‘watercourse’ on an IGN map or the mention of its name on the cadastre. 1: This 22 Feb. 1980 M. FORFILLET req. Nos 15516 and 15517