State ex rel. Hulme v. Grays Harbor & Puget Sound Railway Co.

Citations

• 54 Wash. 530
• 103 P. 809
• 1909 Wash. LEXIS 1030

Syllabus

<p>Navigable Waters — Commerce—Lands Under Waters — Harbor Areas — Leases—Railroad Purposes. The provision, in Const., art. 15, § 1, that the harbor area shall never be sold or granted but shall be reserved for “landings, wharves, streets and other conveniences of navigation and commerce,” has reference to commerce both by land and water, as “navigation” is not used in a restrictive sense; hence, under art. 15, § 2, authorizing the leasing for terms not exceeding thirty years, of the right to build on the harbor area “wharves, docks, and other structures,” the state may lease the right to build a railroad on the harbor area; “other structures” in section 2 being equivalent to “other conveniences” of commerce in section 1 (Rudkin, C. J., Mount, Dunbar, and Crow, JJ., dissenting).</p> <p>Eminent Domain — Necessity—Objections—Crossing Abutting Harbor Area. It is not a valid objection to the necessity of a.railroad company’s condemnation of tide lands, that it must first cross the abutting harbor area and that the constitution and laws prohibit the acquisition of harbor area by condemnation, since the state may lease for thirty years the right to construct a railroad on the harbor area (Rudkin, C. J., Mount, Dunbar, and Crow, JJ., dissenting).</p> <p>Eminent Domain — Damages—Tide Lands — Title—Right to Lease Harbor Area. The owner of tide lands, appropriated by a railroad company, having the preference right to lease the abutting harbor area, is entitled to recover as damages the value of the land taken at the time of the trial and damages to the part not taken, plus the value of the statutory right to lease abutting harbor area; and it is immaterial that the title to the tide land was not acquired from the state until after the condemnation suit was commenced, it having been previously applied for.</p> <p>Eminent Domain — Conditions Precedent — Right to Bridge Stream — Navigation. The consent of the secretary of war to construct a bridge over a navigable stream is not