Maust v. Pennsylvania & Maryland Street Railway Co.

Citations

• 219 Pa. 568
• 69 A. 80
• 1908 Pa. LEXIS 623

Syllabus

<p>Street railways — Consent of owner — Construction of road — Notice— Laches — Injunction—Equity.</p> <p>Where a landowner by words and deeds, not in express language or specific acts, but in effect consents to the grading of a line of street railway and the laying of the track thereof over a public highway on which his lands abutted, and makes no objection to its construction, he is guilty of such laches as will prevent him from maintaining a bill in equity to compel the line to be torn up and its operation enjoined.</p> <p>In such a case, evidence to the effect that the complainant said to the general manager of the defendant company when the latter was looking over the proposed route “I know where you want to go, and go ahead, and I will see you in a few days,” is sufficient to base a finding that the complainant had in fact consented to the construction of the railway over the proposed route.</p> <p>Where street railway companies have been permitted to proceed in the construction of their lines by abutting property owners, or township officers, and largo sums of money have been expended thereon, it would be inequitable and unjust to compel the lines to be tom up or their operation enjoined at the instance of a party who either gave his written or oral consent, or who stood by and said nothing while the work of construction was going on and the expenditures were being made.</p>