28 P.2d 340 | Colo. | 1933
IN a suit in which E. L. St. Clair and others were plaintiffs and the Denver and Salt Lake Railway Company was defendant, the district court rendered judgment on the pleadings in favor of the plaintiffs. The defendant seeks a reversal of that judgment.
So far as necessary to a decision, the pleadings disclose the following situation: On October 31, 1904, the owner of certain land in Gilpin county entered into a contract with the Denver, Northwestern and Pacific Railway Company, whereby the owner of the land agreed to convey to the company a part of her land, and the company agreed "to maintain a station at said point, which station shall be known as `Tolland.'" In performance of her part of the contract the owner conveyed to the company sufficient land for a right of way, a station, and a wye to permit the loading of cars and the switching of trains. The company laid its tracks, built a station, established an agency there and appointed an agent. The defendant succeeded to the rights of that company, and the plaintiffs acquired from the owner a part of the land then owned by her. The plaintiffs acquired their interests in reliance upon the contract obligation assumed by the company. Ever since their establishment the station, the agency and an agent have been maintained, and they now are maintained, at Tolland. Recently the defendant applied to the Public Utilities Commission for leave to discontinue the maintenance of its agency at Tolland and to withdraw its station agent and remove them to West Portal, which is on the other side of a mountain *69 range. The plaintiffs thereupon brought this suit to restrain the defendant from attempting to discontinue such service and from further prosecuting its application to that end before the commission. The defendant intends to maintain its station at Tolland to pick up and discharge passengers, freight, mail and express, and has made no application to abandon or lessen such service.
It is contended by the defendant that the agreement to maintain a station did not include an agreement to maintain an agency and an agent. But for twenty-nine years the defendant has maintained an agency and an agent at Tolland, and that would seem to indicate that by the word "station" the parties meant a regular station with an agency and an agent. It was a practical construction of the contract by the parties.
[1] Contracts like the one before us are made subject to the rights of the public; the contract involved in this suit, therefore, obligated the company and its successor, the defendant, "to maintain a station" at the place designated unless and until the public interest requires its abolition or removal. In Atlanta and WestPoint R. R. Co. v. Camp,
When the public interest requires it, the station at Tolland may be abandoned, notwithstanding the contract. The United States Supreme Court said, in Manigaultv. Springs,
In Ohio Colorado Smelting Refining Co. v. PublicUtilities Commission,
[2] Counsel for the plaintiffs contends that, conceding that the contract requiring the maintenance of the station is subject to termination whenever the public interest requires it, the question whether the public interest does or does not require it must be determined, *71
not by the Public Utilities Commission, but by the court. In this we think he is in error. Prior to the creation of the commission such matters were determined by a court, but the Public Utilities Act vests in the commission powers sufficiently broad to include the power to determine such matters, its orders and decisions being subject to review by the district court. C. L. § 2924, etsec.; Clark v. Public Utilities Commission,
In Denver South Platte Ry. Co. v. City of Englewood,supra, we held that by the Public Utilities Act the Legislature intended to delegate to the commission the administration, supervision and regulation of all service rendered to the public throughout the state.
People, ex rel. v. Colorado Title Trust Co.,
We held in that case that the state has inherent power to regulate and control public utilities within the state; that the Legislature may delegate such governmental authority and supervision to a commission; that the powers of such commission are administrative; that the Public Utilities Commission of Colorado is vested with exclusive jurisdiction to determine whether a railroad company may abandon service upon and dismantle a railroad lying wholly within the state; and that the "junking" order of the court was void. We reversed the judgment and directed the district court to vacate that portion of the order that directed the receiver to case operations upon and to dismantle the road.
In Colorado Southern Ry. Co. v. State RailroadCommission,
And see Chicago, Burlington Quincy R. R. Co. v.Public Utilities Commission,
The commission's general order No. 4 reads: "That before any railroad corporation shall move or abandon any depot or station building or abandon an agency at any station, or discontinue any regular passenger train, said railroad company shall file a statement of such contemplated changes with this Commission at least ten days before their effective date."
That rule was made within the lawful regulatory powers of the commission. The defendant, as we have said, has applied to the commission for leave to discontinue the maintenance of its agency at Tolland and to withdraw its station agent and remove them to another place. *73 The commission has jurisdiction to hear the application and to grant or deny it as the public interest requires. Those objecting to the removal should appear before the commission in the proper manner and resist such application.
The judgment is reversed.
MR. JUSTICE BOUCK did not participate.