St. Louis, Keokuk & Northwestern Railroad v. Knapp-Stout & Co.

61 S.W. 300, 160 Mo. 396, 1901 Mo. LEXIS 63
CourtSupreme Court of Missouri
DecidedFebruary 26, 1901
StatusPublished
Cited by46 cases

This text of 61 S.W. 300 (St. Louis, Keokuk & Northwestern Railroad v. Knapp-Stout & Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Missouri primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
St. Louis, Keokuk & Northwestern Railroad v. Knapp-Stout & Co., 61 S.W. 300, 160 Mo. 396, 1901 Mo. LEXIS 63 (Mo. 1901).

Opinion

GANTT, J.

This is an appeal in a condemnation proceeding by the plaintiff, a railway company, to obtain a right of way over certain real estate in the city of St. Lonis, belonging to the Knapp-Stout & Go. Company. The jury awarded the Knapp-Stout & Co. Company $21,500, and from the judgment on said verdict said last named company has appealed. The original petition was filed on the twenty-second day of November, 1890. Commissioners were appointed, who filed their report December 22, 1891, awarding to the Knapp-Stout & Co. Company $44,000, as damages for the appropriation of the land described in the petition for a right of way.

Exceptions were filed to the report, but the $44,000 was paid into court by the plaintiff railroad company and possession of the route taken by said company and its track constructed thereon. The exceptions were afterward sustained on March 11, 1892. On the fourteenth of October, 1895, an amended petition was filed, substantially the same as the original except it included a stipulation in reference to the manner in which the railroad company would build its road over defendant’s land, in which it gave defendant certain underground crossings from east to west. '

On the eighth of February, 1897, the plaintiff filed' a second amended petition, substantially like the amended petition, but which contained not only the stipulation for the underground crossings, but reserved to the defendant two surface crossings over its right of way, one in prolongation of Salisbury street, and the other wherever defendant, its successors or assigns shall designate, “whenever the land of said owner between Hall street and said right of way shall be filled up to the grade now or hereafter established by the city of St. Louis for Salisbury street, and the land of defendant in the east of the right of way shall be filled up to the grade now or hereafter established by the city to be constructed and maintained [404]*404by the railroad.” A motion to strike out tbe allegations as to the reservations of these surface crossings was overruled, and defendant excepted. The right of way condemned was 'fifty feet wide through a tract containing twenty acres, in the northern part of St. Louis, lying between Destrehan street on the south, and Bremer avenue on the north, Hall street on the west and the Mississippi river on the east, and amounted to a fraction less than two acres of land. The defendant was engaged in manufacturing and selling lumber, and was using this twenty-acre tract for the purpose of yards for storing its stock. It also owned three acres west of Hall street and ten and one-half acres north of Bremer avenue, which it used in said business. The estimated value of the product it handled yearly was in the neighborhood of $1,000,000.'

The right of way was laid out across the eastern part of the twenty-acre tract, at a distance of about four hundred feet west of the Mississippi river, on which had been the levee and the right of way extended the whole length north and south of this dyke. The main portion of the tract was lower than the grade of Hall street and was in part protected from the high waters of the river by the levee.

In the construction of the railroad in pursuance of the stipulation for subways, the company raised its tracks three feet in order to give ample head-room for the subways.

In addition to raising its tracks the railroad company put in two 35-foot steel bridges, one at Salisbury street, and one at the south of the property, one-half of which was on defendant’s land, and one-half on Mallinckrodt’s. It also left fourteen-foot vents at the north end, giving defendant the three underground -crossings as agreed in the stipulation. Salisbury street runs through the lumber yard from Hall street to the west line of the wharf; the lumber company maintained a gate across Salisbury street at the Hall street end. While the [405]*405levee on which the railroad was constructed protected defendant’s lumber yard on the east and south sides, in the high water of 1892 it became necessary to build temporary levees up to Bremer avenue and west on Bremer avenue.

Prior to the construction of the railroad, the defendant lumber company had cut the levee down at the Salisbury street crossing and at the south side of the property, to make roads, and it was oh these roads the subways were constructed. In seasons of high water they had to be filled.

Various and conflicting estimates were given by the witnesses. The experts in real estate on the part of the railroad placed the value of the land taken at from $4,000 to $8,000 an acre, but a fair average of their testimony would be about $5,000 an acra

About eighteen months before the suit was commenced the defendant gave $100,000 for the twenty-three and one-quarter acres. Defendant’s wfitnesses placed the value at about $20,000 an acre.

The theory of defendant was that in addition to the actual appropriation of the two acres it suffered damage to the remainder by reason of being cut off from access to the river. Whereas plaintiff’s witnesses gave it as their opinion that the location of the railroad right through the lumber yard and the increased switching facilities was a benefit from ten to forty per cent to the portion uncondemned.

To reduce this benefit defendant claimed it had a switch connection at the northern line of its property connecting with all the railways entering St. Louis, and that on Hall street, west of the property, were the terminal or switching railways of St. Louis Transfer Company and the Merchants Terminal Eailway Company, which were bound to connect with the property. But as to this claim it appeared that the switch connection at the northern line was a Wabash switch, had been [406]*406granted to one Sckulenberg in violation of tbe laws of tbis State, and tbat no connection conld be required of tbe terminal companies without ordinances of tbe city permitting it, whereas plaintiffs road could be required to connect because it was not compelled to cross any street or alley to make tbe connection with defendant’s lumber yard.

In ordinary stages of water tbe defendant could haul its lumber from the landing on tbe east under plaintiffs railroad, but it insists tbat in extremely high water tbe railroad would impede it because it would not have sufficient space to work in, whereas, before its construction, tbe lumber could be taken from tbe rafts on top of tbe dyke. On tbe other band, defendant’s witness, Mr. Durfee, testified tbat when tbe river was high, tbe company could only tie up one raft because tbe current was too strong; tbat tbe raft must be a small one.

Tbe evidence for defendant not only showed tbe physical conditions before and after tbe appropriation of tbe strip, but tbe court admitted evidence of estimates of tbe necessity for, and tbe cost of readjusting tbe business to tbe yard as changed; and tbe increased expense of transacting the lumber business as tbe result of tbe construction of tbe railroad.

Tbe evidence was tbat they did as large a business after as before tbe railroad was built, and tbe court excluded evidence as to whether tbe defendant’s books showed any increase in expenses.

Tbe ordinance of tbe city was in evidence granting the plaintiff railroad tbe right to enter tbe city at its northern limit and to occupy certain streets until it reached Franklin avenue, and requiring it to connect with business establishments by switches.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
61 S.W. 300, 160 Mo. 396, 1901 Mo. LEXIS 63, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/st-louis-keokuk-northwestern-railroad-v-knapp-stout-co-mo-1901.