In re West Wheeler St. in City of Seattle

• Decision Date: 19 December 1913
• Parties: In re WEST WHEELER ST. IN CITY OF SEATTLE.
• Court: Washington Supreme Court

137 P. 303

77 Wash. 3

In re WEST WHEELER ST. IN CITY OF SEATTLE.

Supreme Court of Washington

December 19, 1913

Department 2. Appeal from Superior Court, King County; J. T. Ronald Judge.

In the matter of the petition of the City of Seattle to acquire property for laying off, widening, extending, and establishing streets and changing and establishing their grades. From an order approving a special assessment roll as prepared and filed by the eminent domain commission of the city, land-owners appeal. Reversed and remanded, with directions.

Geo. E de Steiguer, R. E. Thompson, Jr., Raymond D. Ogden, and Peters & Powell, all of Seattle, for appellant.

Jas. E Bradford and C. B. White, both of Seattle, for respondent.

MOUNT, J.

This is an appeal from an order of the superior court of King county approving a special assessment roll as prepared and filed by the eminent domain commission of the city of Seattle, to which objections have been filed by various property owners. The property owners have appealed.

It appears that in the year 1911 the city of Seattle, by ordinance, authorized the condemnation of certain real property for the purpose of constructing certain overhead bridges and connecting what Queen Anne Hill, in the Magnolia Bluff with Queen Anne Hill, in the city of Seattle. Magnolia Bluff is a headland lying in the northwestern part of the city of Seattle, immediately west of what is commonly known as Smith's Cove. This bluff rises abruptly to a maximum elevation of about 300 feet. To the eastward from Magnolia Bluff lies Queen Anne Hill, which rises abruptly to a maximum height of about 300 feet. Between these two hills is a valley from a half to three-quarters of a mile wide. In this valley is Smith's Cove waterway. Numerous railroads extend north and south lengthwise of this valley. Fifteenth avenue west runs in a northerly and southerly direction along the western slope of Queen Anne Hill. This is the only avenue for traffic between Magnolia Bluff and the lowlands lying between Magnolia Bluff and Queen Anne Hill to the business portion of the city of Seattle. The object of this improvement was to build overhead roadways, extending from Fifteenth avenue west, westward, across the valley between Magnolia Bluff and Queen Anne Hill, so that the residents of Magnolia Bluff might reach the city of Seattle in a more direct and available route than theretofore existed. The roadway leading to Magnolia Bluff, or Twentieth avenue west, and Thorndyke avenue, which is on the eastern slope of Magnolia Bluff, is proposed to be an overhead roadway from 20 to 70 feet high, extending from Fifteenth avenue west on Queen Anne Hill to Twentieth avenue west and Thorndyke avenue on Magnolia Bluff. As a part of the plan it became necessary to condemn a roadway across the lowlands heretofore mentioned. This roadway is 75 feet in width. In order to accommodate the residents living in the lowlands, it was proposed to condemn a roadway from Fifteenth avenue west 150 feet wide, down the side of the hill a distance of about two blocks, to Seventeenth avenue west, lying in the lowlands. The roadways were thus condemned. Seventy-five feet of the roadway from Fifteenth avenue west to Seventeenth avenue west was designed for the overhead roadway extending to Magnolia Bluff, while the northeasterly half of the roadway, 75 feet in width, was to be constructed upon the ground for the purpose of serving the people living in the valley or lowlands. It is apparently conceded in the record that this strip of roadway 150 feet wide from...