Court Opinion

ID: 9696971
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 19:02:43.074349+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:20:28.222542
License: Public Domain

LONG, J.,
dissenting.
I would affirm the decision of the Appellate Division requiring this matter to proceed before the STB, the agency authorized by Congress to implement the ICCTA. 49 U.S.C.A. § 10501. Nothing in the after-decided Riverdale case, supra, justifies a different outcome. 1999 WL 715272. By its own terms, the STB’s ruling in Riverdale is preliminary only; it is subject to change depending on a full review of the facts. Id. at *8. Indeed, as the STB itself acknowledged, there may be additional unresolved preemption issues in Riverdale. Id. at *1 n. 2. Our ruling here is premature and out of conformity, not only with the principles of preemption, but with the well-established rule that litigation is to proceed in a cohesive, and not piecemeal, manner.
In Riverdale, the STB acknowledged that state and local entities “retain certain police powers,” so long as their actions do not “have the effect of foreclosing or restricting the railroad’s ability to conduct its operations or otherwise unreasonably burdening] interstate commerce.” Id. at *5-6. That agency refused, however, to detail which powers it retained and which it ceded “without more information as to the particular police power issues that may be involved in this case.” Id. at *6.
This case should be heard in the first instance by the STB. After a preemption determination by that agency based on these particularized facts, the actual contours of the state case will be clear; at that time, meaningful action may be taken by local authorities subject to state judicial review. In my view, the *464majority has created a haphazard scheme for addressing the difficult issue presented by this ease.
GARIBALDI and VERNIERO, JJ., join in Justice LONG’S opinion.
For modification and remandment — Chief Justice PORITZ and Justices O’HERN, STEIN and COLEMAN — 4.
For affirmance — Justices GARIBALDI, LONG and VERNIERO — 3.