Pittsburg v. Biggert

Citations

• 23 Pa. Super. 540
• 1903 Pa. Super. LEXIS 111

Syllabus

<p>Municipalities — Hoad law — Streets—Sidewalks—Setting Curb — Notice</p> <p>Act of May 16, 1891, P. L. 75.</p> <p>An action of assumpsit may he maintained by a city against a landowner to recover the cost of laying a sidewalk and setting a curb in front of the owner’s premises; but no recovery can be had in such an action if it appears that the owner had no previous notice to lay the sidewalk and set the curb. Philadelphia v. Edwards, 78 Pa. 62, followed; Philadelphia v. Meighan, 159 Pa. 495, distinguished and explained.</p> <p>An ordinance requiring lot owners to lay sidewalks is a police regulation. A duty is imposed, the neglect of which creates a liability — if it be so ordained — to the municipality for the cost it has been put to in doing that which they ought to have done. It is not a tax or local assessment in the nature of a tax based on special benefits accruing or supposed to accrue to the landowner.</p> <p>In the absence of waiver or ground of estoppel, notice is as essential to the imposition of the duty to make the improvement as the enactment of the ordinance; and where there is no duty there can be no default, and therefore no consequent liability to reimburse the municipality for the amount it voluntarily expended. In the absence of notice the owner is neither liable for the whole cost nor any part of it.</p>