Commonwealth v. Phila. R.

Citations

• 135 Pa. 256
• 26 W.N.C. 154
• 19 A. 1051
• 1890 Pa. LEXIS 1180

Syllabus

<p>1. The mere plotting of streets upon a city plan in pursuance of a statute authorizing the making of a plan exhibiting “ where and in what manner such streets, etc., will in future run,” vests in the public no right to use them for travel: proceedings to open are necessary before they become actual streets and the exclusive possession of landowners can be interfered with.</p> <p>2. Such plotted streets may become actual highways merely by public user, but the user which will effect that result must bo defined, uniform, adverse, and under claim of right, and must have continued for twenty-one yeai'S; a permissive user for less than twenty-one j'ears, may, however, establish a public right, if attended by public expenditures and by circumstances clearly indicating the owner’s design to surrender control to the public.</p> <p>3. Upon the trial of an indictment for obstructing a street so plotted,witnesses, who have testified for the commonwealth to travel by the public upon it, may be asked upon cross-examination questions tending to bring out the fact that the travel referred to in their testimony was not uniformly along the lines of the street, but was without regard thereto, and without any defined or located paths.</p> <p>4. The mere fact that a fence, erected by a railroad company along the line of its right of way, is shown to enclose some ground within the lines of a plotted street that was. once occupied by a pavement, the street having been opened, in fact, and paved by the city up to the company’s tracks, is not sufficient to sustain an indictment for obstructing the street, when no authority for paving across the company’s line is shown.</p>