Louisville & Nashville Railroad v. Cincinnati, New Orleans & Texas Pacific Railway Co.

3 Ohio N.P. (n.s.) 109
CourtOhio Superior Court, Cincinnati
DecidedFebruary 1, 1904
StatusPublished

This text of 3 Ohio N.P. (n.s.) 109 (Louisville & Nashville Railroad v. Cincinnati, New Orleans & Texas Pacific Railway Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Ohio Superior Court, Cincinnati primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Louisville & Nashville Railroad v. Cincinnati, New Orleans & Texas Pacific Railway Co., 3 Ohio N.P. (n.s.) 109 (Ohio Super. Ct. 1904).

Opinion

. Smith, J.

This ease comes before me on a motion to dissolve the temporary restraining order heretofore issued.

The plaintiff is the owner of a lot on the southeast corner of Water and Plum streets in the city of Cincinnati, fronting one hundred feet on Water street and about four hundred and fifty feet on Plum, running back southwardly on parallel lines to low water mark on the Ohio rive?. The defendant is the owner of a lot immediately adjoining the aforesaid lot on the east, fronting sixty-six feet on Water street and running back southwardly in parallel lines about four hundred and fifty feet to low water mark on the Ohio river. The plaintiff is also the owner of the property immediately east of the lot of the defendant, fronting over two hundred feet on Water street and running back southwardly in parallel lines about four hundred and fifty feet to low water mark on the Ohio river, and bounded on the east by Elm street.

The lot owned by the defendant was purchased from the executor of the estate of one Regan, and in the discussion o£ the motion has been called the Regan lot.

The defendant company is the lessee of the Cincinnati Southern Railway for a term expiring in 1966. By the terms of its lease the Board of Trustees of the Cincinnati Southern Railroad' are obliged to furnish certain terminals for the lessee, and in pursuance of this obligation are now condemning the land on the. north side of Water street opposite the lots owned by plaintiff and defendant, although the condemnation proceedings are not yet completed.

Water street is a public strefet of the city of Cincinnati, and the Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Chicago & St. Louis Railway Company occupies the middle of the street with a single railroad track known as the Cincinnati connection track, over which it operates engines and cars in great numbers to connect with Other railroad tracks in the city of Cincinnati.

[111]*111In the month of February, 1903, defendant obtained from the Board of Public Service of Cincinnati the right to construct, maintain and operate a single track railroad across Water street from said sixty-six foot lot to land opposite and on the north side of Water street-now in process of appropriation by the Board of Trustees of the Cincinnati Southern Railway for the use of the defendant as lessee as aforesaid.

The defendant has constructed on its sixty-six foot lot on the south side of Water street a railroad track for the use of its engines and ears, intending in time, after the appropriation proceedings with respect to the property on the north side of Water street have been completed, to extend its tracks to said property by crossing Water street under the grant made to it as aforesaid by the board of public service.

The plaintiff filed its petition in this court alleging that the defendant company, having constructed its track on the Regan lot, as has been stated, “is about to extend said track across the sidewalk in front of the said lot owned by it and out into the street, connecting the same with, the said connection track in the centre of said Water street, and in front of and near to the property of the plaintiff above set forth.”

Thereupon plaintiff procured from this court an order temporarily restraining the defendant from crossing Water street until the further order of the court.

The defendant has filed its answer admitting that it intends to extend its track across Water street, but denies that it intends to connect said track.with the connection- track in front of any property of plaintiff; that the only track which it intends or has ever threatened to construct is one that will be wholly within the lines of its said lot sixty-six feet produced northwardly to the north side of Water street, and that it has no intention nor has it ever threatened to place said track in any part of Water street either east or west, of said lot lines produced as aforesaid.

In reply plaintiff alleges that the construction of the track across Water street will interfere with its access and business, and alleges as a further ground for relief that the connection as contemplated between the property owned in fee on the south [112]*112side of Water street by plaintiff with the property on the north side of said street held by it under lease from the Board of Trustees of the Cincinnati Southern Railway would be a violation of Article VIII, Section 6 of the Constitution of Ohio.

As the lot owned by plaintiff on the west side of the Regan lot is given an outlet along Water street to Plum street and the lot owned by plaintiff on the east of the Regan lot is given an outlet along Water street to Elm street, the construction of the contemplated track by defendant company does not leave any of the property of plaintiff in a Mil de sac, and we need not inquire what its rights would be in such a case. The mere .delay in travel caused by crossing the track in getting to plaintiff’s property is one suffered by plaintiff in common with the public, and although it may suffer in a greater degree than the general public, yet its injury is similar in kind to that suffered by the general public, and is therefore damnum absque injuria. This principle is now firmly established in this state. The Robert Mitchell Furniture Co. v. C., C., C. & St. L. R. R. Co. et al, 7 N. P., 639; affirmed by the Supreme Court, 65 O. S., 571.

As to the injury to the access to plaintiff by the construction of the contemplated track by the defendant across Water street. It does not appear in evidence at what point on the north side of Water street the track which the defendant contemplates constructing will cross. The defendant itself, a® I understand it, has not finally determined this point. It merely alleges in its answer that it will be at some point on the north side of Water street within the lot lines of the Regan lot produced.

The defendant urges that it is immaterial where it crosses the north line of Water street so long as it is within the lines of the Regan lot produced, for the reason that an abutting owner has a property interest in that part of the street only which is embraced within his lot lines produced; and therefore whatever interference with an owner’s access arises from an obstruction in any other part of the street is not a taking of property in the constitutional sense of that word. I know of no decision in this state upon this precise question; and I [113]*113do not care to express an opinion upon it until the necessities of the ease require it. Such necessity has not yet arisen for the reason, as I have stated, that it does not yet appear just where the track will cross the north line of Water street; nor is there any evidence offered by plaintiff, if such evidence can be offered, showing in what way the track will interfere with its access if the track comes close to the east line of its west lot produced, or the west line of its east lot produced.

As illustrating the difficulty in declaring a rule as broadly as defendant contends, suppose a lot, say six feet only in width and incapable of access by vehicles without the use of a part of the street opposite adjoining property, would the construction of tracks in the street opposite such adjoining property, which did as a matter of fact injure the access to the six foot lot, nevertheless be not a legal injury to the access'?

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Bluebook (online)
3 Ohio N.P. (n.s.) 109, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/louisville-nashville-railroad-v-cincinnati-new-orleans-texas-pacific-ohsuperctcinci-1904.