Philadelphia v. Sheppard

Citations

• 158 Pa. 347
• 27 A. 972
• 1893 Pa. LEXIS 1589

Syllabus

<p>Municipalities — Ordinances—Fruit stands on sidewalk — Equity.</p> <p>If a city by its ordinance declares that it shall be unlawful to place any goods, wares, or merchandise for sale, upon part of the footway in front . of any house or premises from the line of any street fifty feet and upwards in width, to a greater distance than four feet and three inches, there is a reasonable if not a necessary implication from the ordinance that the city will permit the goods to be placed for sale on the footway within such limit.</p> <p>The erection of suitable stands on which to exhibit the goods allowed to be placed on the footway for sale, cannot be regarded as a violation of such an ordinance. It is the encroachment on the footway beyond the prescribed limit, and not the placing of goods on shelves or stands two or three feet above the footway within it, that is declared to be unlawful.</p> <p>The above construction of the ordinance was acquiesced in by the. city for nearly thirty years. The city, also, with the consent of the commissioners of markets and city property and with the approval of the committee on city property, allowed cake, fruit and other stands to be erected adjoining or in front of its own property. Reid, that the city had no standing in equity to compel the removal of a fruit stand in front of the property of an individual owner, not extending more than four feet three inches from the house-line. .</p>