Vickridge First & Second Addition Homeowners Ass'n v. Catholic Diocese

510 P.2d 1296, 212 Kan. 348, 1973 Kan. LEXIS 526
CourtSupreme Court of Kansas
DecidedJune 9, 1973
Docket46,837
StatusPublished
Cited by10 cases

This text of 510 P.2d 1296 (Vickridge First & Second Addition Homeowners Ass'n v. Catholic Diocese) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Kansas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Vickridge First & Second Addition Homeowners Ass'n v. Catholic Diocese, 510 P.2d 1296, 212 Kan. 348, 1973 Kan. LEXIS 526 (kan 1973).

Opinions

The opinion of the court was delivered by

Kaul, J.:

This was an action to enjoin defendant-appellant from constructing a gymnasium, a baseball diamond, a football field and track facility on property owned by it located in the Vickridge area of Wichita. Plaintiffs-appellees are certain individual homeowners in the area and the Vickridge First and Second Addition Homeowners Association, Inc. Defendant is the owner of Lot 28, Rlock 5 of Vickridge Second Addition to Wichita, comprising approximately twenty-five acres.

The appeal is from a judgment of the trial court enjoining the construction of the baseball diamond and the football and track facilities. Injunctive relief with respect to the gymnasium was denied and no cross-appeal taken.

The appellant owns and operates a coeducational parochial high school on the property in question known as Kapaun-Mount Carmel High School. For many years preceding the events giving rise to this litigation appellant operated two separate high schools in east Wichita. One of the schools was known as Kapaun Memorial High School, a boys school, and the other Mount Carmel, a girls school, was originally located on the tract in question. Within a few years after Mount Carmel had been in operation the area surrounding the campus was developed as a residential area and some of the homes were purchased by the homeownersappellees.

In 1969 appellant commenced consideration of a plan to merge Mount Carmel and Kapaun and tihe result was a decision in 1970 to combine the two schools on the Mount Carmel campus. After study and investigation by committees, together with professional consultants, plans were developed concerning facilities to be constructed in order to serve the function of the combined schools. The original plan to move the Kapaun High School athletic stadium to the Mount Carmel site was abandoned. Architects employed by appellant prepared a site plan including locations and grading which was dated January 17, 1972.

The site plan and other information pertaining to the project [350]*350were made available to appellees through communications and discussions which were taking place at the time.

On April 11, 1972, appellees filed their petition instituting this litigation. In substance appellees alleged that the entire Vickridge area consisted of residential homes, costing between $75,000.00 and $225,000.00, and that the area was advertised during development as being a high quality residential neighborhood. It was alleged that the construction plans of appellant clearly show that the creation of a private nuisance to appellees would result from the actual construction of the planned facilities for reasons which were alleged in the petition as follows:

“(A) That Kapaun-Mt. Carmel High School has a present student enrollment of approximately 700 students and that the planned gymnasium facility is capable of seating 1500 persons at school, city league basketball games; but yet, the Defendant is providing less than 200 parking spaces to accommodate the people it is attracting to its facilities and is not planning to fence its school property. That the clear, necessary and obvious result of the foregoing is to burden almost the entire Vickridge area with a deluge of on-street automobile parking and most assuredly, those persons parking on the streets of the Vickridge Additions will seek the most obvious and direct walking route to the school facilities which will be across the lawns and between the homes of the Vickridge residents.
“(B) That because of the landscape contours of the Defendant’s property and the Defendant’s construction plans in connection therewith, a serious drainage problem will be created in that an inordinate amount of water will be diverted onto the property owned by some of the Plaintiffs, causing partial flooding of their homes and yards.
“(C) That Plaintiffs have been informed and verily believe that the football field, track, and baseball diamond which are located within a few feet of the property boundary lines, are to be used year around by the school and others for the city league athletic events and other athletic contests to the extent that an almost continuous level of athletic activity will be conducted on the facilities and that the present construction plans reveal that adequate ‘screening’ cannot be installed to protect the Plaintiffs from the obvious noise, dust and pollution which will be created by the activity.
“(D) That the effect of Defendant’s entire construction project will be, among other things, to seriously devalue the property owned by the Plaintiffs in the Vickridge First and Second Additions.”

The prayer of appellees’ petition reads as follows:

“Wherefore, Plaintiffs pray that a temporary and permanent injunction be issued against the Defendant, its agents and employees, from constructing the gymnasium, football and track facility and baseball diamond as presently planned until and unless it can be shown that the matters set forth above can and will be eliminated and in all events avoided by proper planning and immediate implementation thereof.”

[351]*351Appellant filed its answer on May 9, 1972, in which it denied that its proposed project would constitute a nuisance to appellees or anyone else and further alleged that:

“. . . [I]s providing adequate parking and drainage facilities for its project; the activities proposed for the area will cause no noise, dust or pollution.”

There was no pretrial conference and the issues of a temporary and permanent injunction were tried together to the court on May 11, 1972.

In the meantime, appellant substantially revised its construction plans, in particular with respect to the drainage system for the football field and in moving the baseball diamond further away from the property lines. A drawing of the revised plan was prepared by appellant’s architects and submitted to attorneys for the appellees several days before the trial. The achitects’ drawings reflected a change order, dated April 28, which substantially changed drainage from the football field and track, and a change order which relocated the baseball diamond sixty feet in a southeasterly direction from the previous location thereof. The revised site plan and change orders were later received in evidence at the trial.

The appellees called five witnesses. R. S. Delameter, a civil engineer, experienced in land use, platting, planning, drainage and real estate development, testified primarily concerning the football and track facilities. Charles Porter, a teacher and coach at KapaunMt. Carmel High School, described the proposed athletic activities and uses and the facilities. Earl J. Callison, a civil engineer with a baseball background as a coach and officer of the city urban little league, testified generally concerning the baseball diamond. James A. Loveland, a Wichita realtor, and Bowen H. Brady, a real estate appraiser, testified that appellees’ properties would suffer diminution of value by reason of the proposed construction.

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Bluebook (online)
510 P.2d 1296, 212 Kan. 348, 1973 Kan. LEXIS 526, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/vickridge-first-second-addition-homeowners-assn-v-catholic-diocese-kan-1973.