If a railroad company uses but does not own a railroad line, should it pick up some of the bill when a neighboring structure is demolished? That was essentially the question before the state Supreme Court last week in Philadelphia. And the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission, along with three intervening parties, all told the high court that freight company Norfolk Southern Railway Co. should bear some of the cost to remove a bridge that was once suspended over the East Hempfield Township railroad crossing that its trains frequently traverse.
The PUC’s attorney, Elizabeth A. Lion Januzzi, argued that the commission’s jurisdiction and ability to allocate costs was "not merely an esoteric legal principle," but rather a matter of safety. Januzzi said the Commonwealth Court had improperly divested Norfolk of the $78,816 or 15 percent of the total cost the PUC allocated against it for the cost of removing the bridge at issue.
