Case Name: CAPITAL PLAZA, INC., Appellant, v. DIVISION OF ADMINISTRATION, STATE of Florida DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION and Leon County, Appellees
Court: Florida District Court of Appeal
Jurisdiction: Florida
Decision Date: 1979-10-11
Citations: 381 So. 2d 1090
Docket Number: No. LL-232
Parties: CAPITAL PLAZA, INC., Appellant, v. DIVISION OF ADMINISTRATION, STATE of Florida DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION and Leon County, Appellees.
Judges: BOOTH, J., concurs.
Reporter: Southern Reporter, Second Series
Volume: 381
Pages: 1090–1094

Head Matter:
CAPITAL PLAZA, INC., Appellant, v. DIVISION OF ADMINISTRATION, STATE of Florida DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION and Leon County, Appellees.
No. LL-232.
District Court of Appeal of Florida, First District.
Oct. 11, 1979.
Rehearing Denied Dec. 20, 1979.
David W. Foerster of Foerster & Hodge, Jacksonville, for appellant.
Margaret-Ray Kemper and H. Reynolds Sampson, Tallahassee, for appellees..

Opinion:
MeCORD, Acting Chief Judge.
This appeal is from a final judgment in an eminent domain proceeding awarding to appellant compensation consisting of the value of the land taken and severance damages. We reverse.
Appellant is the owner of an automobile service station facility located on the southwest corner of the intersection of Thomas-ville Road and Glenview Drive in Tallahassee. By these proceedings, appellees acquired 1263 square feet of appellant's service station facility to be used in a reconstruction of Thomasville Road from a two-lane facility to a six-lane facility with a raised four-foot-high median dividing the driving lanes. Prior to the taking, the service station had unimpaired access to and from all lanes running in each direction of Thomasville Road and Glenview Drive. Appellant argues that the four-foot-high median in the center of the reconstructed Thomasville Road will obstruct access to the service station property from the northbound roadway lanes for automobiles coming in or going out of the station. It contends that the trial court erred in ruling that no evidence would be received concerning the impairment of access to and from the service station by reason of the construction of the raised median, notwithstanding that the appraiser for appellees would testify to greater severance damages if such testimony were allowed. The primary question on this appeal is as follows: Whether the jury, upon proper instruction, should have been allowed to receive evidence on the question of substantial impairment of access due to the existence of the median — not for the purpose of awarding damages therefor as a separate item but only for the jury's consideration of such evidence in connection with its overall consideration of the condemnation in relation to severance' damages, if any. Appellees contend that such evidence is not admissible; that the construction of the median is an exercise of the state's police power, and the jury may not consider any diminution in access to the property resulting from the median construction in arriving at its award.
The above question is resolved by the opinion of the Supreme Court in State Department of Transportation v. Stubbs, 285 So.2d 1 (Fla.1973). Stubbs involved a situation in which a portion of the landowner's property was taken in connection with the building of Interstate 295, a limited access highway. The landowner's property there, prior to the taking, was accessible to automobile traffic moving both north and south on Firestone Road on which the property fronted. After the taking, access to the landowner's property could only be gained by traversing an overpass from the east side to the west side of the interstate highway. The landowner's loss of access in Stubbs was more accentuated than any loss of access to appellant's property here. The principles of law announced in Stubbs, however, apply equally to the present case. The Supreme Court said:
"Ease and facility of access constitute valuable property rights for which an owner is entitled to be adequately compensated."
"The important question is whether there has been a substantial diminution in access as a direct result of the taking. What is 'substantial' is a question of fact posing practical problems of proof for the jury's consideration. Where some right of access is still available, as would appear in the cause under consideration, it is for the jury to determine whether the resulting damages are nominal or substantial. See State Road Department of Florida v. McCaffrey, [229 So.2d 668 (Fla.App.1969)] supra; Stoebuck, supra at 765."
". . In a situation of this kind where a portion of one's property and/or access rights to an existing road is taken for limited access road purposes, Section 338.04 as construed in the Anhoco case requires consideration by the jury of severance damages for loss of access rights."
The court went on to point out in Stubbs that "access," as a property interest, does not include a right to traffic flow even though commercial property might suffer adverse economic effects as a result of a diminution in traffic. It held that one has a right to introduce evidence at trial of severance damages resulting from physical impairment of access rather than for an impairment in "traffic flow."
In the case sub judice, appellant was entitled to have the jury consider, as a part of severance damages, evidence relating to the median which, although it did not completely prevent vehicles approaching from the south from reaching the station and vehicles leaving the station from reaching the northbound traffic lanes (in both instances over a more circuitous route), it did eliminate the free access as to the northbound lanes which existed prior to the taking. As stated in Stubbs:
"[I]t is for the jury to determine whether the resulting damages are nominal or substantial."
It was, thus, error to exclude this testimony from the jury's consideration under proper instruction by the court. Cf. Simkins v. City of Davenport, 232 N.W.2d 561 (Iowa 1975).
We have considered the remaining point raised by appellant and find it to be without merit.
REVERSED. '
BOOTH, J., concurs.
LARRY G. SMITH, J., dissents.