Chicago, Peoria & St. Louis Railway Co. v. Nix

Citations

• 137 Ill. 141
• 27 N.E. 81
• 1891 Ill. LEXIS 1026

Syllabus

<p>1. Eminent domain—as to land not taken—elements of damage—evidense—opinions of witnesses. Any person knowing property and its value may be examined to prove its value, though he may not be engaged in the buying and selling of that character of property, the weight to be given to his testimony being left to the jury.</p> <p>2. So a witness may be allowed to give his opinion as to what injury or damage the construction and operation of a railroad over a tract of land will be to the parts of the land not taken for right of way, without showing his experience in such matters.</p> <p>3. In a proceeding to condemn a strip of land for a railroad right of way over a farm, the land owner asked a witness what, in his judgment, would be the injury or damage to the remaining portion of the farm outside of the right of way. It was objected that the question did not confine the witness to the effect of the construction and operation of the railway upon the market value of the abutting property: Held, that the opinion called for was entirely proper for the defendant to ask the witness to give, and that it was incumbent upon the petitioner, if it was apprehended that such opinion embraced improper elements of damage, or rested upon an improper basis, to bring such fact to light by cross-examination.</p> <p>4. In such a case, an instruction that “the jury, in assessing the damages to the owner, may take into consideration, not only the value of the land taken, but all the facts which contribute to produce the damages to that not taken, or that the farm is put in a worse shape for cultivation or pasturage ; that some portions of it are more dangerous for use; that there is danger of fire from passing engines, and all other actual inconveniences and damages the property may sustain in its use, not only for the present, but for the future,” was good in substance, subject only to the criticism of failing specifically to refer to the evidence.</p> <p>5. In so far as the noise necessar