Tara Eng'g Corp.. v. City Of Newark

Decision Date08 January 1945
Docket NumberNo. 232.,232.
Citation40 A.2d 559,132 N.J.L. 370
PartiesTARA ENGINEERING CORPORATION v. CITY OF NEWARK et al.
CourtNew Jersey Supreme Court

OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE

Certiorari proceeding by Yara Engineering Corporation, a New Jersey corporation, against the City of Newark and others, to set aside the airport zoning ordinance of defendant city.

Ordinance set aside.

October term, 1944, before CASE, BODINE, and PORTER, JJ.

Riker, Marsh & Shipman and Irving Riker, all of Newark (Samuel Kaufman, of Newark, of counsel), for prosecutor.

Philip J. Schotland, Corp. Counsel of Newark (Joseph A. Ward, of Newark, of counsel), for defendants.

PORTER, Justice.

On February 23, 1944, the Board of Commissioners of the City of Newark adopted an ordinance referred to as the ‘Airport Zoning Ordinance of the City of Newark.’ In its preamble it recited that its purpose was to regulate and restrict the height of structures and objects of natural growth and to otherwise regulate the use of property in the vicinity of Newark Municipal Airport by creating airport approaches and turning zones and establishing the boundaries thereof. The legality of this ordinance is challenged by the prosecutor, who is the owner of certain parcels of vacant land within the Newark Airport and the Port Terminal adjacent to it.

The City has for many years been acquiring salt meadow or marsh land within its boundaries and reclaiming it by filling to a level of 8 1/2 feet above mean sea level. It built and has developed Port Newark Terminal on the water front and adjacent to it an airport called the Newark Municipal Airport. The City has invested public funds in these enterprises of many millions of dollars. Until the early part of 1942, when the City leased a part of Port Newark Terminal and the entire airport to the United States, it had operated the property as a business enterprise. It received in rentals for parts of this property, from about 1927 until April 1, 1944, over two and one-half millions of dollars.

It appears that most of the land embraced within the Newark Airport is owned by the City but that among other land privately owned are some sixteen parcels owned by prosecutor. The City agreed to purchase these parcels, and the Board of Commissioners adopted a resolution on March 8, 1944, for the payment of the agreed price, upon the filing and approval of a deed. The deed was delivered, approved by the Law Department of the City, and recorded by it on March 10, 1944, in the office of the Register of Deeds for Essex County. The City did not pay the prosecutor the consideration agreed upon. On March 14, 1944, the Board of Commissioners adopted a resolution purporting to rescind the resolution authorizing the purchase of March 8, 1944. In this situation prosecutor filed a bill of complaint in the Court of Chancery seeking appropriate relief. However, we are not concerned with the pending litigation or with the lease to the United States, but solely with the legality of the ordinance.

The airport approach zones and airport turning zones provided for in the ordinance extend for a considerable distance, two miles from the...

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21 cases
  • City of Trenton v. Lenzner
    • United States
    • United States State Supreme Court (New Jersey)
    • November 22, 1954
    ...100 A.2d 668 (1953). The public use may be proprietary as well as strictly governmental in nature. Cf. Yara Engineering Corp. v. Newark, 132 N.J.L. 370, 373, 40 A.2d 559 (Sup.Ct.1945); Brady v. Atlantic City, 53 N.J.Eq. 440, 448, 32 A. 271 (Ch.1895); Jahr, Eminent Domain (1953) 14, 16. What......
  • McCarran International Airport v. Sisolak
    • United States
    • Supreme Court of Nevada
    • July 13, 2006
    ...646-47 (1964); Indiana Toll Road Commission v. Jankovich, 244 Ind. 574, 193 N.E.2d 237, 242 (1963); Yara Engineering Corporation v. City of Newark, 132 N.J.L. 370, 40 A.2d 559 (1945). 73. Yara Engineering Corp., 40 A.2d at 560. 74. Id. at 561. 75. Jankovich, 193 N.E.2d at 242. 76. Id. at 24......
  • Town of Bloomfield v. New Jersey Highway Authority, A--114
    • United States
    • United States State Supreme Court (New Jersey)
    • April 25, 1955
    ...opinion we said: 'The public use may be proprietary as well as strictly governmental in nature. Cf. Yara Engineering Corp. v. (City of) Newark, 132 N.J.L. 370, 373, 40 A.2d 559 (Sup.Ct.1945); Brady v. Atlantic City, 53 N.J.Eq. 440, 448, 32 A. 271 (Ch.1895); Jahr, Eminent Domain (1953), 14, ......
  • New Jersey Builders Ass'n v. Department of Environmental Protection
    • United States
    • New Jersey Superior Court – Appellate Division
    • June 12, 1979
    ...sought to be protected, preservation of the swampland, and therefore constituted a "taking." See also, Yara Engineering Corp. v. Newark, 132 N.J.L. 370, 40 A.2d 559 (Sup.Ct.1945); Plainfield v. Middlesex Borough, 69 N.J.Super. 136, 173 A.2d 785 (Law The relevant general rule was stated by J......
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