Title: MISSISSIPPI STATE HIGHWAY COM'N v. Vaughey

State: mississippi

Issuer: Mississippi Supreme Court

Document:

358 So. 2d 1307 (1978) MISSISSIPPI STATE HIGHWAY COMMISSION v. E.A. VAUGHEY, as general partner of Mississippi Valley Capital Company, a Mississippi limited partnership. No. 50017. Supreme Court of Mississippi. May 3, 1978. Rehearing Denied May 31, 1978. Thomas, Price, Alston, Jones & Davis, John H. Price, Jr., A.F. Summer, Atty. Gen. by Frank E. Shanahan, Jr., Asst. Atty. Gen., Jackson, for appellant. Watkins, Pyle, Ludlam, Winter & Stennis, L. Arnold Pyle, William A. Pyle, Jackson, for appellee. Before SMITH, WALKER and COFER, JJ. COFER, Justice, for the Court: This cause has been appealed to this Court by the Mississippi State Highway Commission (Commission) from a judgment for $57,600 awarded by a jury in the Circuit Court of the First Judicial District of Hinds County in favor of E.A. Vaughey, as general partner of Mississippi Valley Capital Company, a Mississippi limited partnership *1308 (Vaughey), as damages to appellee's realty suffered by the closing of a portion of the west frontage road between McDowell Road and Daniel Lake Boulevard, fronting upon I-55 South in the City of Jackson. In the early 1960's, Commission located and built the frontage road here involved. About 1965, it executed plans to construct an "on-ramp" from McDowell to the southbound lane of I-55 highway, and, to do so, it determined that a segment of the west frontage road from the south boundary of McDowell southward approximately 800 feet long would have to be utilized therefor and discontinued as a frontage road. The precise date of the discontinuance of the segment as a public road is not clear, but it was in 1965. It was stipulated that the closing of it was more than six, but less than ten years before Vaughey brought this suit. In the place of the discontinued segment of the frontage road, Commission converted Kingswood Avenue into a frontage road, which is well marked as such by signs and is easily recognizable as such. Kingswood connects with McDowell approximately 160 feet west of the former intersection of the frontage road therewith, and causes travel 1,200 feet along Kingswood as compared to 1,000 feet along the removed segment of the frontage road. Vaughey's property, at its northernmost point, is 800 feet south of the barricade on the frontage road routing traffic onto Kingswood. His property nowhere abuts on the closed portion of the frontage road. Alleging that this action of the Commission damaged a valuable property right he had as owner of the said property, he brought this action. Both parties treated the recovery, if any, to which Vaughey was entitled as being the difference in the value of the land immediately before the taking and its value immediately after the taking, and experts' proof was aimed at this determination. Commission incorporated in its answer a plea in bar, asserting that statutes of limitation, Mississippi Code Annotated, Sections 15-1-49 and 65-1-59 (1972), bar Vaughey's action. This plea was overruled, and the cause proceeded to trial. On this appeal, Commission has assigned numerous errors of which only three the court's action on the plea in bar next above mentioned, the court's error in overruling its requested peremptory instruction, and the court's failure to grant judgment to Commission notwithstanding the verdict are necessary to be considered, and they, or either of them, will dispose of the appeal. Vaughey contends that the adverse possession statute, Section 15-1-13, governs, and that he is not barred from his suit. In Louisiana & Mississippi Railroad Transfer Co. v. Long, 159 Miss. 654, 131 So. 84 (1930), appellants had for a long period of time used land of appellee abutting on the Yazoo Canal or Yazoo River, for mooring their boats by means of cables attached to trees on appellee's land. The suit sought judgment for the rental value of appellant's said use and occupancy of his land for a period of ten years before filing the suit. The court gave a six-year instruction, and on appeal it was held that the right of action was not barred until the expiration of six years from the date of its accrual. 159 Miss. at 667, 131 So. at 88. While we do not believe Mississippi Code Annotated, Section 65-1-49 (1972), included in Commission's plea in bar, is applicable here, it is noted that that statute fixed a maximum six-year limitation on actions by persons having an interest in lands on which easements are given for highway purposes. This is not a situation where length of time, ten years or six years, was necessary in order for a cause of action to accrue to Vaughey. The action, if any, accrued at the very time of the closing of the segment of the road, no passage of time was necessary before suit might be brought, and the statute applicable to the action then began to run. Mississippi Code Annotated, Section 15-1-51 (1972). This being true, if a cause of action lay, there is no sound reason why Commission should be left in suspense during an entire ten year period awaiting action against it for the closing. *1309 We cannot agree that the adverse possession statute governs, but we conclude that Section 15-1-49 controls, and the action had become barred before it was begun. Romano v. Yazoo & M.V.R.R., 87 Miss. 721, 726, 40 So. 150 (1905). Although we dispose of the case on the basis of the plea in bar, we notice and are of the opinion that the peremptory instruction requested by Commission should have been granted. Full jurisdiction of this I-55 highway and its frontage roads is vested in Commission. Mississippi Code Annotated, Section 65-1-19 (1972), as amended, and Section 65-1-1, et seq. Under this authority, it may establish, relocate, or abandon frontage roads. If it chooses to establish such a road, we do not understand that it binds itself to cause such a road to be contiguous to and parallel with I-55, or not to alter the route of it, as appears to it advantageous to the ever increasing traveling public. See Muse v. Mississippi State Highway Commission, 233 Miss. 694, 103 So. 2d 839 (1958), wherein it is said: See also Harreld v. Mississippi State Highway Commission, 234 Miss. 1, 103 So. 2d 852 (1958). Vaughey is not an abutting owner on the segment taken out of use, but his property, fronting on the portion still in use, extends far toward the frontage road's exit near Daniel Lake Boulevard which remains open. Also, the property has convenient access to McDowell by way of Kingswood Avenue. The exhibits reflect Greenwood Street as passing through the property, and this street affords direct access to Daniel Lake Boulevard on the south and McDowell Road on the north. Mississippi State Highway Commission v. Burge, 239 So. 2d 914 (Miss. 1970), involved the closing of a street just east of appellee's property, but appellees had continued access to a street on the north side of their property, by traveling over 800 additional feet to reach the highway. It was there said: Puyper v. Pure Oil Company, 215 Miss. 121, 60 So. 2d 569 (1952), involved the closing of a portion of a street. The chancellor held: that complainants were not abutting property owners entitling them to compensation for the street closing; that they had *1310 no special interest in the use of the vacated street for access purposes to their property because their property did not abut on that portion of the street which was closed; that they had sufficient and adequate access to and from their property; and, that they sustained no special damage by the street closing not shared by the general public. We said on appeal of the case: In Town of Wesson v. Swinney, 144 Miss. 867, 110 So. 669 (1927), the landowner did not abut on the closed segment of the street and we held that this damage was no different in kind from the property owners generally in the town, although he, the appellee, had a mercantile establishment on his lot, to which store the frequency of the travel on the street west of his lot brought trade, and the result of the closing of the street "was that a large part of the traveling public which had theretofore passed along the street in front of appellee's lot on the west was diverted to the new street crossing." 144 Miss. at 871, 110 So. at 669. In Mississippi State Highway Commission v. Irby, 190 So. 2d 445 (Miss. 1966), it was held that: We find no damage accrued to Vaughey differing from that suffered by the public generally, and that the peremptory instruction should have been granted, and, not having been granted, the commission's request for judgment notwithstanding the verdict should have been sustained. We therefore reverse the cause with judgment here for the Commission. REVERSED AND RENDERED. PATTERSON, C.J., SMITH, P.J., ROBERTSON, P.J., and SUGG, WALKER, BROOM and LEE, JJ., concur. BOWLING, J., took no part.