Court Opinion

ID: 9625180
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 07:30:25.335368+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:06:02.149842
License: Public Domain

ARNOLD, Justice,
(specially concurring).
Although I concur in the general rule of law announced in the syllabus and in the result reached by the majority opinion, the question raised by Mr. Justice O’NEAL in his dissent should be discussed.
Defendants Drinkwater owned certain property in Belle Isle Addition in Oklahoma City which fronted on Classen Boulevard on which was situated a filling station and garage. The City of Oklahoma City brought this action asking for a.n order requiring defendants to remove certain appurtenances located in Classen Boulevard belonging to them and used in conjunction with said filling station and garage. Upon hearing the trial court ordered the. city to remove at its expense the appurtenances complained of without prejudice to any action by defendants for damages growing out of the construction work then in progress on Classen Boulevard. Thereafter defendants filed their cross-petition seeking consequential damages to their property by reason of the change by the city of the grade of Classen Boulevard. The City denied the allegations of the cross-petition. The cause was tried to a jury resulting in a verdict in favor of the City. Motion for new trial filed by defendants was sustained by the Court on the ground that certain instructions defining the city’s liability to a property owner because of change of grade were erroneous, provoking this appeal by the City of Oklahoma City.
The instruction given was to the effect that if, after having once established a grade, a city thereafter changes such grade proximately resulting in damages to real property, then the owner thereof is entitled to such damages as is shown by the evidence to have resulted; but if the city has never before established a grade when it does so establish one and such grade so established is reasonable under all the surrounding circumstances it is not liable for any damages resulting from the establishment of such grade.
The undisputed evidence shows that Belle Isle Addition was platted and the streets therein dedicated in 1907; that on October 22, 1929, the City by ordinance brought such addition into the city limits; that prior to that time streets had been graded, surface paving installed, water, gas, sewer, and other utility and service lines installed; that after taking such addition into the city limits the City maintained both Classen Boulevard and Western Avenue on the grade levels as they existed until in July, 1950, in co-operation 'with the State Highway Department and according to plans and specifications submitted by it, the City and State Highway Department started construction of a “by-pass” State Highway over Classen to Western Avenue and through Belle Isle Addition; that the City by ordinance changed the grade of Classen and Western to conform to the plans and specifications of the State r Highway Department; that by reason of excavation for the underpass called for by these plans the new surface of Classen was placed some 14 feet below the ground level of defendants’ property and of the street grade intersections existing since the original surfaces were graded and improved; that defendants’ property thereby became inaccessible to approach from Western Avenue and from all through traffic on the by-páss and 'from all traffic-going east on Classen, leaving only a one-way narrow strip of pavement in front of the property involved, which pavement was; too narrow to allow trucks or cars to enter the garage situated on the property.
If, as stated in the dissenting opinion and . the authorities cited therein, the grade established in 1950 was the first grade established by the city then defendants could under no circumstances recover consequential damages resulting therefrom and a new trial would amount to a waste of time and an abuse of discretion by the trial court. *1111If, however, the city used the power vested in it to fix grades in an unreasonable, unusual, and unnecessary manner, in a way that reasonable men could not have anticipated at the time of purchase would ever be pursued so that it could not have been assented to by the owner at the time of purchase, City of Mangum v. Todd, 42 Okl. 343, 141 P. 266, L.R.A.1915A, 382 or if the city by its conduct without formal ordinance adopted the grade in existence when Belle Isle Addition was incorporated in the city limits it is bound by such conduct, Thorberg v. City of Hoquiam, 77 Wash. 679, 138 P. 304, and defendants are entitled to recover whatever consequential damages they have suffered by reason of the change of grade.
Under the facts in this case the city recognized the grade in existence at the time it incorporated this addition into the city limits for a period of more than 20 years; it expended public funds for maintenance of the streets on the existing grade, for the upkeep of water, sewer, and other utility lines; it allowed property owners to expend large sums of money for improvements in reliance upon the grades long existing. In my opinion such conduct is tantamount to fixing the grade and it should be bound thereby. So you have in legal effect the fixing of another grade and there was therefore no abuse of discretion in granting a new trial.