Becker v. Lebanon & Myerstown Street Railway Co.

Citations

• 30 Pa. Super. 546
• 1906 Pa. Super. LEXIS 119

Syllabus

<p>Street railways — Wrongful construction of road — Injuries to land — Damages —Malice.</p> <p>Where a street railway company lays its tracks on a public highway without the consent of an abutting owner, and this is done wrongfully, but without malice, and there is a resultant permanent injury to the real estate, the extent of the damage caused thereby is to be measured by the resulting depreciation in the value of the property. In such a case no malice can be inferred from the mere wrongful laying of the tracks, where the act was committed before the relative rights of street railways and abutting owners had been adjudicated by the courts.</p> <p>The mere fact that the road was not located in the center of the highway, but along the side of the road where it worked a greater injury to the landowner, does not affect the rule as to damages, or permit the owner to sue as for successive trespasses.</p>