Court Opinion

ID: 9787978
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 00:28:24.322004+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:37:02.988324
License: Public Domain

Bergan, J. (dissenting).
The main difficulty with the award of $883,754 made at Special Term is, as the Appellate Division *433noted, that it would exceed any appraisal of unit land value in the record.
. The Appellate Division did not set forth its land unit values, but the result reached, $467,000, was consistent with a calculation based on $2.'50 a square foot for the land in the manufacturing zone, and $.75 a square foot for the area in the residential zone.
The respondent city demonstrates mathematically in its argument here the consistency between the record in these respects and the Appellate Division.
This is in addition to the “ most cogent ” evidence of value considered by the Appellate Division — the purchase price of $165,000 three and a half years before condemnation. To restore, as the court is doing on the weight of evidence, an award of $883,754 gives the owners a 500% increase through a public condemnation in a very short period.
Values have gone up, as the record shows, by about 250%. They have not gone up twice that amount and the weight of evidence lies- with the decision at the Appellate Division.
The order should be affirmed.
Chief Judge Fuld and Judges Burke, Scileppi and Breitel concur with Judge Gibson ; Judge Bebgan dissents and votes to affirm in a separate opinion in which Judge Jasen concurs.
Order reversed, etc.