Court Opinion

ID: 9699371
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 20:21:16.084383+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:20:49.484992
License: Public Domain

ROBERTS, Justice,
dissenting.
Today’s decision impairs the ability of sewer authorities to allocate sewer construction costs fairly and cheaply. It unfortunately abandons a wise decision of the Superior Court which has helped stabilize sewer assessment proce*247dures over the past decade. Upper Gwynedd Twp. Auth. v. Caltabiano, 206 Pa.Super. 476, 214 A.2d 288 (1965).
Appellants own and live in a dwelling house on a lot which abuts a public street both front and rear. Their neighborhood did not have sewer facilities before 1970. In the early 1970’s, appellee built a sewer system in the area. As part of a single project, appellee ran sewers past both the front and rear of appellants’ lot and assessed appellants an amount calculated upon the “front footage” of both the front and rear of the lots. Appellants hooked their house up to the front sewer only, and challenged the assessment for the rear sewer.
A landowner may not be assessed a share of the costs of a project improving utility service unless the project benefits his property in some way. See Whitemarsh Twp. Auth. v. Elwert, 413 Pa. 329, 196 A.2d 843 (1964). A landowner is entitled to present evidence that his land will not be benefited by any particular public improvement project. Id.
The public improvement project as a whole, including both the front and rear sewers, benefits appellants. A house with a great deal of frontage is usually more valuable than one with little frontage. See Upper Gwynedd Twp. Auth. v. Caltabiano, supra. I believe this is true whether the frontage extends for a long distance along one street, extends around the corner of a block, id., or, as here, is broken up into front and rear frontage. It is reasonable to conclude that the increase in value of the property caused by installation of a sewer project will be roughly proportional to the front footage of the sewer abutting the property. See Wilson v. Upper Moreland-Hatboro Joint Sewer Authority, 183 Pa.Super. 588, 591, 132 A.2d 909, 910 (1957) (citing cases); aff’d upon opinion of Superior Ct., 392 Pa. 245, 140 A.2d 450 (1958). Thus assessing appellants for footage both front and rear imposes upon them costs roughly proportional to the benefits which they receive.
There are further equitable and financial reasons to impose both front and rear footage costs upon appellants. *248First, the additional costs which the size and shape of appellants’ lot imposes upon the sewer construction project are proportional to the front footage of the sewer along both the front and rear of appellants’ lot. Second, because lots with greater front footage are usually more valuable, they “are therefore more able to bear assessment . . . .” Upper Gwynedd Twp. Auth. v. Caltabiano, 206 Pa.Super. at 480, 214 A.2d at 290. Third, because both the front and rear sewers were built as part of a single project, it may be that neither sewer would have been economically feasible without the other, in which case appellants certainly receive a benefit from the fact that both were built.*
In sum, where a sewer project is found to benefit a property, the entire front footage of the property along which the project runs should be assessable. See Upper Moreland-Hatboro Joint Sewer Auth. v. Pearson, 190 Pa.Super. 107, 112-13, 152 A.2d 774, 776-77 (1959) (analyzing authorities). As the Superior Court later stated:
“The present case is similar to the situation presented where three lots abut upon a sewer constructed in a street; one lot is 50 feet in width, another 100 feet in width and another 300 feet in width. Single connections are made from the residence on each one of the lots. It might be argued that each one received the same amount of benefit but it has been considered equitable to assess the 100-foot lot twice as much as the 50-foot lot and the 300-foot lot six times as much as the 50-foot lot.”
Upper Gwynedd Twp. Auth. v. Caltabiano, 206 Pa.Super. at 479, 214 A.2d at 290.
Because the majority’s decision will require abandonment of modification of a system for allocating sewer construction costs which is both fair and easy to apply, I dissent.

 Thus, the majority misperceives the nature of benefits accruing from sewer line construction when it states that the sewer abutting the rear of appellants’ property could not benefit the property solely because appellants could not lawfully build another dwelling on the land.