New York, West Shore & Buffalo Railway Co. v. Fevre

Headnote

Saüroad company— taking of land for — how the owner’s damages, where his land is separated Iry a highway, are to he determined.

Appeal from the appraisal and report of commissioners appointed to ascertain and determine the compensation to be made to the owners of property sought to be taken by the New York, West Shore and Buffalo Railway Company.

The court at General Term said: “We have had occasion to examine recently the rules applicable to this class of cases, and do not think it necessary to discuss them now at any length.

“ The present is not a case of two city lots, separated by a street and used independently of each other.

“ It is the case of a dwelling-house with some ten acres of land adjacent and occupied in connection, through which a turnpike road runs, dividing the land into two parts. In this case, therefore, the

owner of the land was entitled to have the damages to the whole property estimated, including that on the west side of the turnpike. The land should have been treated as a whole, and the injury to it as a whole should have been assessed. To give the owner damages only for the injury to the part east of the turnpike would afford no fair or reasonable compensation. And in refusing to consider the injury to the land as a whole, including that west of the turnpike, the assessor did injustice to the owner.”