Neumann

When property acquired by eminent domain is part of a larger parcel, compensation must be awarded for the injury, if any, to the remainder (Cal. Const., art. I, § 19; U.S. Const., 5th Amend.; Code Civ. Proc., § 1263.410, subd. (a)). Such compensation is commonly called severance damages. When the property taken is but part of a single legal parcel, the property owner need only demonstrate injury to the portion that remains to recover severance damages. The question presented here is whether, and under what circumstances, separate but contiguous legal parcels in common ownership currently devoted to diverse uses may be aggregated to form a “larger parcel” in order to prove entitlement to severance damages.

We conclude that such separate legal parcels may be aggregated and considered as one “larger parcel” when the owner establishes a reasonable probability that all of the contiguous commonly owned lots will be available for development or use as an integrated economic unit in the reasonably foreseeable future. We do not hold that the property owners here are entitled to an award of severance damages; rather, we conclude that the matter must be remanded to the trial court…

I

I dissent.

The majority engage in hand-to-hand combat with California case law on severance damages, and by assiduously distinguishing cases on their facts, dismissing language as unfortunately broad, and questioning whether earlier opinions really meant what they said, arrive at the doubtful conclusion that the rule they adopt is not precluded by precedent. Startling by its absence is reference to any California authority that actually supports the rule adopted by the majority, that is, that mere potential future unity of use may be the basis for a claim of severance damages.

My own contrary view depends not only on an examination of the California case law regarding the precise issue presented, but also on a consideration whether the rule adopted by the majority is reasonable and just in the broader context of the law of eminent domain. That law seeks to accommodate a tension between the right of the state, necessary to government and community life itself, to condemn property for public use, and the right of the individual landowner to be compensated when the state appropriates his or her land. A rule that permits the landowner who retains his or her land to claim…

When property acquired by eminent domain is part of a larger parcel, compensation must be awarded for the injury, if any, to the remainder (Cal. Const., art. I, § 19; U.S. Const., 5th Amend.; Code Civ. Proc., § 1263.410, subd. (a)). Such compensation is commonly called severance damages. When the property taken is but part of a single legal parcel, the property owner need only demonstrate injury to the portion that remains to recover severance damages. The question presented here is whether, and under what circumstances, separate but contiguous legal parcels in common ownership currently devoted to diverse uses may be aggregated to form a "larger parcel" in order to prove entitlement to severance damages.

We conclude that such separate legal parcels may be aggregated and considered as one "larger parcel" when the owner establishes a reasonable probability that all of the contiguous commonly owned lots will be available for development or use as an integrated economic unit in the reasonably foreseeable future. We do not hold that the property owners here are entitled to an award of severance damages; rather, we conclude that the matter must be remanded to the…