Railroad company files condemnation suit

The second-largest railroad company in the United States, Norfolk Southern Railway Co., has filed another lawsuit to gain control of valuable land on the Wilmington Riverfront that the railroad alleges was illegally seized by the state’s inverse condemnation attorney.

The company requesting the that the state’s Superior Court set aside a 2006 condemnation judgment granted to the Delaware Department of Transportation that resulted in the state getting title to nearly two acres of ground. Alleging it was unaware about the eminent domain action involving its South Madison Street property, Norfolk Southern wants the case reopened in order to get access to an area that contains railroad tracks and billboards facing I-95 - which could bring in advertising revenue for the transportation giant.

Company representatives said a title search should have located the deed that gave the mailing address as Norfolk Southern Railway Co. in Roanoke, Va. The railroad alleges it didn’t receive a copy of the condemnation proceeding until May 4, the first documentation it says it received. 

The condemnation judgment is void because DelDOT lawyers for the eminent domain action in 2006 made “the grossly negligent misrepresentation” that a diligent search for the property owner had been done and “no known owners” found, according to company representatives. 

Norfolk Southern has insisted the judgment by Superior Court is preempted by federal law and therefore the state court lacked jurisdiction to condemn the land. The company is looking for every loophole and opportunity in state property laws that will help it get it’s hands on the terrain.

So far, the department has not commented on the matter other than to say it would be filing DelDOT’s response to the motion before a scheduled Sept. 4 hearing, according to an inverse condemnation lawyer for DelDOT. 

This is the second legal action Norfolk Southern has filed this summer.

The railroad brought suit in federal court in July after receiving a letter from DelDOT that the department would fence in a portion of the land to begin construction “no later than August 1” on parking spaces for the 14-screen cinema now under construction on an adjacent lot.

That case, which was brought against the development group behind the cinema project, including the Riverfront Development Corp. and Buccini/Pollin Group Inc., is now working through the court. DelDOT is not a party to that lawsuit.