Case Name: The Kansas City Northwestern Railroad Company v. Charles Schwake
Court: Kansas Supreme Court
Jurisdiction: Kansas
Decision Date: 1904-11-05
Citations: 70 Kan. 141
Docket Number: No. 13,707
Parties: The Kansas City Northwestern Railroad Company v. Charles Schwake.
Judges: Johnston, C. J., Cunningham, Greene, JJ., concurring.
Reporter: Kansas Reports
Volume: 70
Pages: 141–156

Head Matter:
The Kansas City Northwestern Railroad Company v. Charles Schwake.
No. 13,707.
(78 Pac. 431.)
SYLLABUS BY THE COURT.
Railroads — Liability to Adjoining Landowners for Excavation of an Alley. Where a railroad company appropriates an alley in a city for the purpose of laying its tracks, and makes a deep excavation therein close to the lot line, the damages recoverable by an abutting owner are restricted to the special injury sustained by him by reason of being cut off from access to, and egress from, his property. A landowner does not suffer damages recoverable at law for injury to lateral support of his ■ property until the earth is so much disturbed that it slides or falls. The actionable wrong for impairment to lateral support, is not the excavation, but the act of allowing the owner’s land to fall.
Error from Leavenworth district court; Jambs H. Gillpatrick, judge.
Opinion filed November 5, 1904.
Reversed.
STATEMENT.
Plaintiff below, defendant in error here, is the owner of six lots in the city of Leavenworth, each fifty feet in width, facing on Front street and extending back and abutting on an alley in the rear. Plaintiff in error laid a railway-track in the alley. Preparatory thereto it dug a ditch more than twenty feet in width and from eighteen to twenty feet deep. It is alleged in the petition that the railroad company “appropriated the said alley for the whole width thereof, and a< part and portion of the west end of the said lots of the said plaintiff as aforesaid, permanently, to its own exclusive use, and obstructing the same, and ruining the said alley for public use, and destroying all ingress and egress thereto and therefrom, and leaving, such ditch or canal in such shape that the lateral support to the plaintiff’s lots has been wholly removed and destroyed, and because thereof much of the plaintiff’s lots along such canal from time to time has. slipped and fallen into the said canal, thereby greatly and permanently injuring his said property.” .
It must be assumed that plaintiff below failed to-prove that the railroad company extended the excavation outside the alley and upon the west end of his lots, for the reason that the damages allowed by the jury, indicated by their answers to special questions, were for loss of use of the alley and for the impairment-of lateral support of the lots. In answer to particular- questions of fact the jury found that they allowed $25 as damages for the destruction or impairment of the lateral support of lot No. 1; $75 for lot 2; $125 for lot 3 ; $150 for lot 4 ; $175 for lot 5 ; and $200 for' lot 6. The jury itemized the damages allowed as follows :
“For destruction of lateral support of lots Nos. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6, $750, and for the permanent loss of use of alley appurtenant to lots 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6, $200.”
The following question and answer appear in the record :
“72. Q,ues. If you find a general verdict for the plaintiff, state how much, if anything, you allow as damages because of any portion of lot 1 having slipped or fallen into the excavation made for such railroad, prior to the commencement of this action. Ans. Nothing.”
The same response was made to like questions respecting each of the other lots.
The jury found specially that the construction of the railroad interfered with Schwake’s usual manner of ingress to, and egress from, his lots, and that the use of the alley which he rightfully enjoyed was destroyed.
The general market value of the six lots immediately prior to the construction of the railroad was found to be $9000 ; immediately after, $8050. The total difference in value was $950, for which amount the jury returned a verdict against the railroad company.
The following questions were asked, and answers returned by the jury :
“140. Ques. If you find a general verdict for the plaintiff, state how much, if anything, you allow as damages for the future cost or expense of constructing a stone wall along 'the lots in controversy. Ans. No ; we made allowance for that in damage in lateral support.”
“160. Q,. If you find a general verdict for the plaintiff, then state whether, in arriving at the amount of such verdict, you have considered any loss or damage which plaintiff has sustained or may in the future sustain after the time of the construction of the track in said alley. 'A. Yes.
“161. Q,. If the last above question is answered ‘Yes,’ then state what such items consist of. A. Taking away the lateral support of the lots and the destruction of the alley and its use.”
Defendant below filed a motion asking the court to set aside so much of the amount of the general verdict as was rendered for deprivation of lateral support of the lots, to wit, $750. It also filed a motion for anew trial. Both motions were overruled and judgment for $950 entered on the verdict.
The instructions to the jury were to the effect that a railroad could not destroy the alley for public use, and that if it was so destroyed the plaintiff might treat the act of the company as a permanent appropriation of the alley, and of his interest therein, and recover as damages the consequent depreciation in the value of the lots ; that, in such case, plaintiff would be entitled to the difference between the market value of his property immediately before the alley was appropriated for railroad purposes and the market value immediately after such appropriation; that an abutter on an alley in a city has the right of ingress to, and egress from, his property, of which he cannot be deprived by any person or corporation appropriating the alley to his or its own private use. There were no instructions which authorized the jury to consider damages arising from an impairment of lateral support of the lots.
None of the evidence is preserved in the record. The railroad company assigns error in the action of the court for entering judgment on the findings for the amount of $750 for destruction of lateral support of the lots. It contends that judgment could go against it for $200 only, the amount allowed by the jury for the permanent loss of the use of the alley.
Waggener, Dosier & Orr, for plaintiff in error.
.Baker & Baker, for defendant in error.

Opinion:
The opinion of the court was delivered by'
Smith, J.:
The case was tried and proceeded to judgment in the court below on the theory that the obstruction to the alley was a permanent appropriation of it by the railroad company. Such appropriation involved the weakening of the lateral support of the rear end of the lots abutting on the alley by reason of an excavation to the depth of eighteen feet, made to accommodate the railroad-track. Entering into the verdict, as disclosed by the findings of the jury, was the element of damages caused by the impairment to the lateral support of the land afforded by the soil adjacent thereto which the lots naturally had before the excavation was made. An allowance was made for the future cost of building a stone wall at the back of the lots. The jury awarded no damages because any portion of the lots had slipped or fallen into the excavation.
It is a general rule, to which we have found no exception, that a landowner does not suffer damages recoverable at law for injury to lateral support of his property until the earth is so much disturbed that it slides or falls. The principle was well stated in Schultz v. Bower, 57 Minn. 493, 496, 59 N. W. 631, 47 Am. St. Rep. 630, 632, thus :
"Where one, by digging in his own land, causes the adjoining land of another to fall, the actionable wrong is not the excavation, but the act of allowing the other's land to fall."
A leading case on the subject was decided in the house of lords, in which it was held that the statute of limitations began to run on an action for damages based on impairment of lateral support of land not from the time of excavation but from the actual occurrence of. the mischief, which in that case was the subsidence of the earth by the working of a mine under the plaintiff's land. (Backhouse v. Bonomi, 1 B. & S. 970.) Counsel in the case referred to argued that the plaintiffs were entitled to recover prospective damages for any loss which they could have shown would arise, or might reasonably be expected to arise, from the withdrawal of lateral support. It was decided otherwise. The following cases are in point: Williams v. Kenney, 14 Barb. 629; Ludlow v. The Hudson River Railroad Co., 6 Lans. 128; Smith v. Seattle, 18 Wash. 484, 51 Pac. 1057, 63 Am. St. Rep. 910; Fremont, E. & M. V. R. Co. v. Harlin, 50 Neb. 698, 70 N. W. 263, 36 L. R. A. 417, 61 Am. St. Rep. 578. See, also, section 590 of Jones on Easements.
While it was competent for plaintiff below to prove the market value of the lots before and after the appropriation of the alley to show the extent of the injury sustained by him, yet his damages, under the uniform decisions of this court in like cases, must be confined to the diminution in value occasioned by the peculiar and special injury sustained by being cut off from access to, and egress from, the land. Decrease in market value occasioned by an injury apart from the loss of use of the alley cannot be shown by bringing into the case an element of damage for which no action would lie. The cases of L. N. & S. Rly. Co. v. Curtan, 51 Kan. 432, 33 Pac. 297, and C. B. U. P. Rld. Co. v. Andrews, 26 id. 702, cited by counsel for defendant in error, do not sustain their views on the right of the lotowner to recover for injury to lateral support.
Plaintiff in error asks that the judgment of the court below be modified by a direction that the sum allowed for damage to lateral support be eliminated from it.. A review of the particular questions of fact submitted to the jury, and their answers thereto, satisfies us that they are so conflicting that no judgment for either party can be sustained. The jury found that the difference in the market value of the lots before and after the appropriation was $950 ; that they had depreciated that much. On this finding judgment must go for plaintiff below, and such finding seems to have followed a proper submission of the case to the jury, for the court did not instruct that damages for injury to lateral support might be recovered, and, in the absence of evidence, we cannot say there was any proof of it. The jury allowed $750 for injury to lateral support. This conflicts with the finding as to-market value before and after appropriation, and is at variance with the theory on which the case was-seemingly tried, inasmuch as there was nothing in the instructions authorizing a recovery for damage to lateral support, and none of the evidence is before us.
It may be said that the jury, under the theory on which the case was tried, did not and could not consider the damage to lateral support, and did not mean that they had when they answered that the general market value of the lots was $9000 immediately before the appropriation and $8050 immediately afterward. The finding that an allowance of $750 was made for destruction of lateral support is in direct- conflict with the findings respecting market value, when we consider that the findings as' to value were made without any evidence before the jury regarding the question.
The judgment of the court below will be reversed and a new trial granted.
Johnston, C. J., Cunningham, Greene, JJ., concurring.