Romano v. B'ham Ry. L. & P. Co.

62 So. 677, 182 Ala. 335, 1913 Ala. LEXIS 465
Supreme Court of Alabama·Decided June 5, 1913·Published·Cited by 12 cases

Opinions

SAYRE, J.

Appellants filed this bill for an injunction to abate a nuisance. The averment is that appellants. oAvn four adjacent lots at the corner of Pratt [338] boulevard and Twentieth street in the residence section of that part of the city of Birmingham, formerly known as Ensley. The lots are vacant, but are being held for sale or future use as places of residence. Within a year, and since complainants acquired their property, defendant has constructed oh a lot immediately across the street from appellants’ property a large gas holder or reservoir in which illuminating or fuel gas is kept for distribution to its customers in the neighborhood. It is averred that “said gas reservoir or gas holder is continuously emitting fumes and gases polluting the air in that vicinity with unpleasant and unwholesome odors which are deleterious to the health and comfort of persons living and residing in that vicinity and particularly to persons who might reside on the real estate of complainants.” To show their own injury, appellants aver that the sale of their property for any reasonable price has been and is now being prevented, the value thereof as a place of residence is “absolutely ruined, and its value is greatly depreciated.”

Prom the chancellor’s opinion, written in explanation of the grounds upon which his decree proceeded, it is to be observed that two concurring considerations operated to bring about his conclusion against the equity of the bill.- Other objections were taken to the bill, but they have not appeared to us to- contain merit, and, inasmuch as we have been unaided by a brief for appellee, we have assumed that it is willing to rest its case upon the grounds which were sustained in the court below, and shall'confine the statement of our views to those points.

1. It did not appear to the chancellor that the structure in question, or defendant’s use of it, constituted a menace to the future use of complainants’ lots as vacant property. There has been no physical invasion [339] of that part of the solid earth over which complainants have acquired exclusive ownership and dominion; but their ownership extends usque ad ccelum, and within the limits of that ownership they are entitled to the flow of pure air. The right is incident to the ownership of land, and must be protected as well as any other valuable right. “No man has a right to interfere with the supply of pure air that flows over another’s land any more than he has to interfere with the soil itself.”— Cavile v. Kilner; 26 L. T. (N. S.) 277; Wood on Nuisances (2d Ed.) § 544. It is not denied, therefore, that any sensible pollution of the air which flows over complainants’ property, to a degree in excess of such pollution as is fairly incident to the ordinary use of land in that neighborhood, would constitute an actionable injury; but the proposition of the decree is that complainants shall have no relief in equity by way of injunction, but should be remitted to their action at law for damages, because the property is vacant and complainants’ comfortable enjoyment thereof has not been invaded or diminished. Of course, it does not follow that, because complainants might have an action at law, they cannot resort to equity. The remedy at law must be adequate to redress the particular injury complained of. An owner is entitled to be secured in the full beneficial nse of his property and his complete dominion over it so long as his use and dominion does not invade the corresponding legal rights of his neighbors. The Code of 1907 has defined a private nuisance as one which may injure either the person or property of another. —Section 5198. In adjusting rights and remedies between parties in respect of the uses to which real property may be devoted, regard must be had for the future. It is to secure the future that equity intervenes. Complainants and defendant alike, when they acquired prop[340] erty in a neighborhood set apart to residential purposes, took it with certain implied restrictions on their use of it. Complainants are also entitled to be secured in the peculiar present and future advantages of the neighborhood. This was clearly recognized by this court in the case of Sloss-Sheffield Co. v. Johnson, 147 Ala. 384, 41 South. 907, 8 L. R. A. (N. S.) 226, 119 Am. St. Rep. 89, 11 Ann. Cas. 285. Complainants ought not to be required to submit to a use of defendant’s property, a use hurtful to complainants and others, though valuable to defendant, which a court of equity would deny to complainants in respect to their own property on the application of other neighbors. A court of equity interposes by injunction to prevent future injury in respect of a legal right attaching to land simply on the ground of the damage it will produce to the land and its ownership, and in a case like this it is of no consequence whether complainants reside on their property or not. — Wilson v. Townsend, 1 Drew. & Sm. 324; Peck v. Elder, 3 Sandf. (N. Y.) 126.

2. Assuming as a matter of common knowledge to know in a general way, at least, the processes involved in the manufacture, storage, and distribution of artificial gas because those processes are very old, the chancellor, in the absence of averments that gas was manufactured on defendant’s named premises and that its escape resulted from an irremediable defect in defend-' ant’s holder or reservoir, assumed to know that the trouble of which the bill complained could be remedied by calking the seams of the reservoir, or by tightening its rivets at the point of escape, and that there was nothing inherent in the structure and use of such reservoirs to render the escape of gas irremediable as might be the case if gas were manufactured on the premises.

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Romano v. B'ham Ry. L. & P. Co., 62 So. 677, 182 Ala. 335, 1913 Ala. LEXIS 465 (Ala. 1913).

62 So. 677 (Romano v. B'ham Ry. L. & P. Co.) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.

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