Opinion ID: 1419944
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 11

Heading: Access

Text: Wal-Mart complains the City has taken access from it. According to Wal-Mart, K.S.A. 26-513(d)(2) specifically lists [a]ccess to the property remaining as a factor which must be considered if shown to exist. View is also specifically referred to in K.S.A. 26-513(d)(5). Furthermore, Wal-Mart asserts, Kansas Appellate Courts have held that factors which affect market value may be considered by experts in eminent domain cases, even when they are not specifically enumerated in K.S.A. 26-513(d). (Citing Willsey v. Kansas City Power & Light Co., 6 Kan App.2d 599, 631 P.2d 268, rev. denied 230 Kan. 819 [1981] [where testimony of a real estate expert that public fear of power lines materially affects market value held admissible in a condemnation proceeding].) We find Wal-Mart's contentions unavailing. Wal-Mart has misused the term access in crafting its arguments. The district court held that there was no taking of access as a matter of law. Wal-Mart does not challenge that ruling here. The City did not permanently close any of the entrances or exits to the property. Wal-Mart still has four entrances located as they were before the project. In addition, Wal-Mart also has the same access to the same streets it previously had. The changes that so heavily affect Wal-Mart are the changes in the direction and flow of traffic. Wal-Mart does not have the same loss of access claims as the landowners in Kohn, 221 Kan. 230, or McCall, 215 Kan. 390. Thus, no right of access has been taken. Wal-Mart's complaints stem from the regulation of traffic flow. Wal-Mart says the critical question is whether restricted access and view can be considered in determining the market value of the property for a damage award under K.S.A. 26-513(d). Wal-Mart has simply repackaged the unreasonable use of the police power argument. The rationale of Hales, Hudson, and Small supply a negative answer to Wal-Mart's question. K.S.A. 26-513 does not allow landowners to recover indirectly what they could not recover directly. Otherwise, landowners who have had some small portion of their land condemned and then claim damages from changes in traffic flow but have not lost a right of access would recover when others who must proceed in an inverse condemnation action with the same damage claim will not. Stated differently, landowners suffering the same types of damages due to changes in traffic flow would recover in some instances, but not in others. Wal-Mart also claims damages for loss of view, essentially arguing that because Kellogg is now a raised freeway, motorists cannot see Sam's from certain vantage points. Wal-Mart's claim finds no support as a common-law easement of view. The easement of view or ancient lights doctrine protected landowners from neighbors who would erect structures blocking light or air from the landowner. Kansas has never adopted the doctrine. See Anderson v. Bloomheart, 101 Kan. 691, 692, 168 Pac. 900 (1917). Wal-Mart's claim also finds no support as a right to be seen. A right to be seen claim for damages (for example the advertising value of a location) is generally denied. See 4A Nichols on Eminent Domain § 14A.03[4] (3d ed. rev. 1998). View in K.S.A. 26-513(d) means view from the property. K.S.A. 26-513(d)(2) specifically uses the term [a]ccess to the property remaining (emphasis added). When construing a statute, we should give words in common usage their natural and ordinary meaning. International Ass'n of Firefighters v. City of Kansas City, 264 Kan. 17, Syl. ¶ 2, 954 P.2d 1079 (1998). We will not rewrite the K.S.A. 26-513(d)(2) language [a]ccess to the property remaining to mean access to the highway remaining. We hold, based on case law developed since the passage of K.S.A. 26-513, access to the property remaining as used in K.S.A. 26-513(d)(2) refers to a right of accessand not changes in traffic flow. Similarly, view does not mean view from the highway or the right to be seen. We are not suggesting that all of our case law is consistent when viewed with an eye toward these distinctions. However, as a general rule, where a right of access has been taken, landowners have been compensated. See Kohn, 221 Kan. 230; Teachers Insurance, 221 Kan. 325; and McCall, 215 Kan. 390. And, where regulation of traffic flow has been at issue, the analysis is, and always has been, one of reasonableness. We acknowledge inconsistencies in prior cases dealing with changes in traffic flow such as Garrett, 259 Kan. 896, and Riddle v. State Highway Commission, 184 Kan. 603, 339 P.2d 301 (1959). Garrett will be discussed later in this opinion. As for Riddle, we acknowledge that it contains language favorable to Wal-Mart. Expert testimony such as that at issue here was allowed in Riddle. However, the use of Riddle as authority for Wal-Mart's claims under K.S.A. 26-513 is questionable. Riddle was decided by a fragmented court four years before K.S.A. 26-513 was enacted. We previously noted the divisiveness of Riddle. See Small, 240 Kan. at 120. We now point out its inconsistency with the well-established rule of reasonableness and our later case law. Wal-Mart cannot recover for the diminution of value of its land due to the changes in flow of traffic where those changes are a reasonable exercise of the City's police power.