§ 5-801

Any county, in its name, may acquire the fee simple title, or such lesser interest as may be desired, to any lands, rights or other property necessary for the construction, maintenance or operation of any county highway, township road, district road, shared-use path for nonvehicular public travel, sidewalk, or bike path within the county or necessary for the locating, relocating, widening, altering, extending or straightening thereof, by purchase or gift or, if the compensation or damages cannot be agreed upon, by the exercise of the right of eminent domain under the eminent domain laws of this State. The county shall not be required to furnish bond in any eminent domain proceeding. When, in the judgment of the county, it is more practical and economical to acquire the fee title to inaccessible remnants of tracts of land from which rights-of-way are being acquired than to pay for damages to property not taken, the county may do so by purchase but not by eminent domain proceedings. When acquiring land for a highway on a new location, and when a parcel of land one acre or less in area contains a single family residence, which is in conformance with existing zoning ordinances, and only a part of said parcel is required for county highway purposes causing the remainder of the parcel not to conform with the existing zoning ordinances, or when the location of the right of way line of the proposed highway reduces the distance from an existing single family residence to the right of way line to ten feet or less, the acquiring agency shall, if the owner so demands, take the whole parcel by negotiation or condemnation. The part not needed for highway purposes may be rented, sold or exchanged by the acquiring agency.

Legislative History

(Source: P.A. 102-452, eff. 8-20-21.)