Providence & W. R. Co. v. Norwich & W. R. Co.
| Decision Date | 13 January 1885 |
| Citation | 138 Mass. 277 |
| Parties | Providence and Worcester Railroad Company v. Norwich and Worcester Railroad Company |
| Court | United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court |
Argued October 2, 1884.
Worcester.
Bill in equity, filed April 23, 1883, for an injunction to restrain the defendant from entering upon and using a strip of land about twenty-eight hundred feet long and twelve feet wide, in Worcester, owned in fee by the plaintiff and being a part of the location of its railroad. The answer admitted that the plaintiff owned the land in fee; and alleged that, by virtue of the St. of 1871, c. 343, and by a decree of the board of railroad commissioners, the defendant had filed its location over the land in question with the county commissioners.
The case was reserved by Holmes, J., on the pleadings and proofs for the consideration of the full court, and appears in the opinion.
Bill dismissed.
G. F. Hoar, for the plaintiff.
F. P. Goulding & G. T. Dewey, for the defendant.
OPINION
It is well settled, as the general rule, that a right conferred by the Legislature to build or extend and maintain a railroad between certain termini does not, prima facie, give the power to lay out such railroad over land already devoted to a like public use by the location of another railroad or highway. But it is an equally well-settled qualification of the rule, that when it appears by the statute, or by the application of the statute to the subject matter, that the contemplated road cannot reasonably be built without appropriating land already devoted to public use, an implication arises that the Legislature intended that such appropriation might be made. Housatonic Railroad v. Lee & Hudson Railroad, 118 Mass. 391. Worcester & Nashua Railroad v. Railroad Commissioners, 118 Mass. 561. Boston & Maine Railroad v. Lowell & Lawrence Railroad, 124 Mass. 368. Fall River Iron Works v. Old Colony & Fall River Railroad, 5 Allen 221. Springfield v. Connecticut River Railroad, 4 Cush. 63.
It was the purpose of the St. of 1871, c. 343, to establish a union passenger station in the city of Worcester, for the joint use of all the railroads running into that city. The station was to be on the line of the Boston and Albany Railroad Company, but its location was not precisely fixed by the act: it was left to be fixed, within certain prescribed limits, by three commissioners to be appointed by this court. When the commissioners made their report, and it was accepted by the court, the location of the station became established, and all the provisions of the act are to be interpreted as applying to the location thus fixed, in the same manner as if it had been determined by the act itself.
When the act was passed, and the place of the station established, the tracks of the Providence and Worcester Railroad Company ran easterly from the junction station to Green Street, a point not far from the new station, upon a location parallel to, southerly of, and adjoining the location of the Boston and Albany Railroad Company; the tracks of the Norwich and Worcester Railroad Company crossed at grade the tracks of the Boston and Albany Railroad Company at the junction depot, westerly of the location of the Providence and Worcester Railroad Company, and thence ran to its station on Foster Street in the heart of the city. It was one of the purposes of the act to avoid this crossing. It provides for the discontinuance of the location of the Norwich and Worcester Railroad Company between the junction depot and the Foster Street station; it provides also, in § 14, that the corporations may pass said junction depot with express trains without stopping, thus implying that there was to be no crossing there. The act also provides for the discontinuance of the tracks of the Boston and Albany Railroad Company running to the Foster Street station, and it is clear that one of its purposes was to prevent the use of any tracks with steam power through the heart of the city on the northerly side of the present location of the roads.
The Legislature had in view this state of facts when it enacted, in § 9, that "the Norwich and Worcester Railroad Company may extend its railroad from the junction depot in said city to said union passenger station; and the Providence and Worcester Railroad Company may extend its railroad from its present terminus at Green Street in said city to said union passenger station; and, for the purposes aforesaid, said corporations respectively may take such portions of the location of the Boston and Albany Railroad Company as the parties agree, or, in case of disagreement, as the board of railroad commissioners determines;" -- and when it provided, in § 15, that "said corporations may severally or jointly purchase or take such lands as are necessary for any and all the purposes aforesaid, or for additional tracks."
These provisions do not in express terms authorize the Norwich and Worcester Railroad Company to take the land of the plaintiff; but we think they do so by reasonable implication. The situation to which the act was to be applied was this: the tracks of the Norwich and Worcester Railroad Company crossed those of the Boston and Albany Railroad Company at the junction depot westerly of the tracks of the Providence and Worcester Railroad Company; it was to extend its road easterly to the new union station. It is true it was not impossible for it to cross the road of the Boston and Albany Railroad Company, and by laying its tracks through the most populous part of the city, filled with dwellings and manufactories, reach the new station; or, by deflecting to the south and twice crossing the road of the Providence and Worcester Railroad Company, gain access to the new station; but either of these routes would contravene the purposes of the statute above referred to. On the other hand, the most direct route to the new station was to run over the ground taken by the location of the other two railroad companies, but not occupied by their tracks.
We think this last route was the one the Legislature had in mind. The provision of § 9, as to taking a part of the location of the Boston and Albany Railroad Company, shows this. The provisions of § 11, for the location and construction of one or more tracks for freight purposes, for the joint use of the four roads therein named, show this; for the defendant could not conveniently, if it could possibly, avail itself of the tracks there provided for, unless it ran over a part of the locations of the other two railroad companies. [*] Taking all the provisions of the act and applying them to the actual situation of the different roads interested, it seems clear that it was the intention of the Legislature to authorize the defendant to take land within the locations of the other roads in order to extend its road to the new passenger station, and that the scheme of the statute and the purposes of the Legislature could not reasonably be carried out in any other way. The plaintiff contends that the provision of § 9 above cited, authorizing the two railroad companies to take such parts of the location of the Boston and Albany Railroad Company as the commissioners may determine, by implication excludes the power to take any part of the location of the plaintiff's road. But we do not think this was its purpose. It was intended for the protection of the Boston and Albany Railroad Company, and to make certain that its location would not be encroached upon to any greater extent than seemed to the commissioners just and reasonable.
But the plaintiff contends that the defendant, if it had the authority to take a part of the plaintiff's land, has not made a valid location, in pursuance of such authority. Section 15 provides that the "said corporations shall file locations of all lands so taken within three years after the passage of this act." This time was afterwards extended to June 1, 1876. St. 1873, c. 31, § 3.
In May 1876, the defendant filed its petition to the board of railroad commissioners, praying that the board would...
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