This one’s a doozy. The New York Court of Claims awarded $12,104,006 for the taking of a CSX railroad right of way between the Bronx and Queens. Now get this: the state contended that the value of the taking should be zero. They don’t have jury trials in eminent domain in New York, so this award was by a judge.
The case caption is N.Y. Central Lines v. State of New York, N.Y. Court of Claims No. 102648, opinion filed September 23, 2010.
We hope to learn more about this one, but for now you can get some details from the Owners Counsel blog. http://ownerscounsel.blogspot.com/
The smiling property owners’ lawyer is Michael Rikon of New York City. Nice going, Mike.