Word: outlot Part of Speech: noun Etymology: From out- + lot. Pronunciation: /ˈaʊtlɒt/ 1. A plot of undeveloped land, sometimes without access to public roads, designated by a developer on a plat for future construction or noted for its unsuitability to be designated a full lot. Example: The court ruled that although Moquino did not have any plans to build on his outlot, Ntchorere violated the owner's property rights by erecting a portion of her mansion on the eastern corner of the site. Example: Where the owner of land, in platting it, designated a small strip, 20 feet in width, lying between lots and the street, which he dedicated to the public, as an outlot, and numbered it with other similar strips, and did not use the land, and the public made no use of it, there was no intention shown to dedicate. 2. A lot that corresponds with an in-town lot, being an open space on the edge of town where the owner can grow some crops and, in some cases, pasture some livestock. Labels: historical Example: We are next to inquire whether the proprietors of outlots, &c. are entitled to commonage. This question not only affects the interests of the holders of outlots, but has a material bearing, in one respect, on the next point which remains for examination. It depends on the construction of the act of the 11th of September 1787, an act to empower the supreme executive council to lay out a town and otherwise to apportion the lands contained in the tract of land reserved for the use of the state, &c. In the second section the president or vice-president in council are empowered to cause to be laid out and surveyed a town in lots, with a competent and suitable number of outlots for the accommodation thereof in the said tract, and to cause to be surveyed and laid out the residue of said tract in lots, the last mentioned lots not to be less than an acre nor more than ten acres each. In the third section, upon the return of the survey, the president, &c. are authorised to sell said lots as they shall deem most to the advantage of the state. That is, after being surveyed, &c. in the manner pointed out in the second section, they are directed to sell them to the best advantage. And in the fourth section the president, &c. are directed to reserve, out of the lots of the town, so much as they shall deem necessary for a court house, jail and market house, for places of public worship, and for burying the dead; and without the town, one hundred acres for a common pasture; the streets, lanes and alleys of the lots and outlots are to be common highways forever. The act also directs the manner in which the lots and outlots shall be sold. The object of the legislature in this plan of sale was to raise as much money as possible for the payment of the public debts, and by annexing this privilege, the lots were enhanced in price. To effectuate the sale and to render the lots more valuable to purchasers, when they direct the survey of the town in lots, they also direct to be annexed thereto, a competent and suitable number of outlots for the accommodation of the owners of the inlots, thereby clearly evidencing the intention, that the one should be a mere incident or accessory to the other, attached to it for the purpose of enhancing its value at the sale. The survey was made, and the town laid out according to the act, and the property was disposed of according to these terms and conditions. In the opinion of the court, by the terms of the contract, the outlots are appurtenant to, or incident to the inlots. They are component parts of the same purchase, and although it is true, as a general rule, that land cannot be appurtenant to land, for a thing corporeal, as is said, cannot be appendant to another corporeal thing, yet this general rule is subject to exceptions. In the Lessee of Hill and others v. West, 4 Yeates 142, it is ruled that, by a general deed made in 1704, by the first purchase of five thousand acres, with the appurtenances, city lots incident thereto, though previously surveyed, will pass together with liberty lands, unless a contrary intention can be shown. It is ruled that the first purchasers held their city lots as appurtenances, or as incident to their purchases of five hundred acres. The intention, that it should be an incident, is not more clearly expressed than in this contract. In the fourth section, the right of common is expressed as appurtenant to the lot in the town, which can be none other than the inlot, to which the outlot is but an incident. It speaks of the lots of the said town, meaning the town of Alleghany, properly so called, and directs that, without the said town, one hundred acres shall be reserved for a common pasture; and although it does not expressly say for whose use this shall be reserved, yet the reasonable construction is, that it was intended for the use of the owners of the inlots. This construction is strengthened by the patent, which describes the common as the common ground belonging to the town. In the case of the Trustees of the Western University v. Robinson, the chief justice says, it would be absurd to suppose that one hundred acres of land, &c. were reserved for the use of all the inhabitants of Pennsylvania. Although it is not absurd to suppose the common to be reserved for the use of the owners of outlots and their alienees, yet such a construction would prove highly inconvenient in process of time, which the legislature must have foreseen, and this is an argument of some weight against the pretensions of the owners of outlots. When the legislature devised this plan, it was supposed to be on a scale abundantly large to accommodate all the inhabitants, and that the outlots would be a great convenience in a variety of ways to the holder of lots within the limits of the town. No idea would seem to have been entertained of its present extent; for if this had been believed, it is not very likely that this common of pasture would have been annexed, either to the inlots or outlots, which, instead of being an accommodation or convenience, may possibly prove, if improperly managed, a public nuisance, and greatly retard the improvement of the town. Example: In Louisiana and Missouri there were two chief forms of grants—urban and rural. These urban grants consisted of inlots, outlots, and common lands, very much like the Pennsylvania plan, but on a broader basis. The earliest settlers, for social reasons and protection, seemed to favor settling together. The rural grants varied from several hundred to thousands of acres, the league square, consisting of 7,056 arpents, not being unusual.