Stevenson v. Mellor

Citations

• 246 Pa. 596
• 92 A. 713
• 1914 Pa. LEXIS 565

Syllabus

<p>Party walls — Use—Contribution—Bill in equity — Injunction.</p> <p>1. An adjoining owner is not liable to contribute for the use of a new party wall where he does not subject the new wall to any use which he could not have made of the old wall prior to its removal.</p> <p>2. A bill in equity for an injunction restraining the use of a party wall until contribution for the cost is made, is properly dismissed where it appears that the plaintiff replaced the original party wall with a larger and deeper one; that in erecting their new building defendants excavated the cellar to an average depth of three feet below the old surface; that the original wall was old and out of repair, but there was nothing to show that it would not have supported defendant’s new building; that while the ceiling in the old building followed the line of the roof, the ceiling in the new building was lowered, hanging partly from the roof and resting partly on the party wall; that there was no testimony that the chimney could not have been built against the old wall; and that while the construction of defendant’s building was in effect new, the use of the new wall was substantially the same as that made of the old wall.</p> <p>German National Bank v. Mellor, 238 Pa. 415, followed.</p>