Case ID: ri_22/html/0064-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Per Curiam.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Woonsocket Street Railway Co. vs. City of Woonsocket.
    PROVIDENCE
    APRIL 25, 1900.
    Present : Matteson, C. J., Stiness and Tillinghast, JJ.
    (1) Street Railways. Control bg City Council. Location of Route.
    
    Although. Gen. Laws R. I. cap. 77, § 5, is evidently intended to give a large discretion to town and city councils, with which the court would not be disposed to interfere upon slight grounds, yet where the city has directed the construction of a route by a street railway company through narrow streets and over a narrow bridge, a portion of the proposed route being near to existing tracts of the company, the court must regard such order as unreasonable within the provisions of said chapter 77, section 5, of the General Laws.
    Petition in Equity, under provisions of Gen. Laws R. I. cap. 77, §5. The respondent city had contracted with the petitioner, granting to the latter the exclusive right for the term of twenty years of operating a street railway in said city, subject to the conditions, limitations, and obligations of chapter 77 of the General Laws. It was provided in said contract that whenever in the opinion of the city council the public good required that a line should be constructed in said city in addition to the lines then in operation, the city council might order the petitioner to build and construct such line, subject to the right of the petitioner to file its petition in equity in the Supreme Court praying for a decision whether such order or enactment was reasonable in the premises. The respondent city passed a resolution ordering the petitioner to build and operate a line over a certain described route. The respondent objected for various reasons set forth in its petition, which reasons were denied in the answer of the respondent.
    Heard on petition and answer.
    
      John J. Heffernan, for petitioner.
    
      Emvin J. France, for respondent.
   Per Curiam.

Gen. Laws cap. 77, § 5, is evidently intended to give a large discretion to town and city councils, with which the court would not be 'disposed to interfere upon slight grounds. But in this case, owing to the narrowness of some of the streets through which the city of Woonsocket has ordered the complainant to extend its road, the narrow bridge on Sayles street, and also the nearness of a portion of the proposed layout to existing tracks, the court is of opinion that the order in question is unreasonable.