Marin Municipal Water District v. Northwestern Pacific Railroad

This appeal involves the pleading of rights and duties incident to subjacent support of land, and a determination—apparently not heretofore made by an appellate court—of whether the common law rule of subjacent support has been modified by statute in California.

Appellant, plaintiff below and herein called “district,” owned a public water system which included two pipe mains installed in the land surface on the crest of a hill. Respondent (herein “railroad”) owned a railroad tunnel which ran through the hill beneath the district’s mains. The tunnel collapsed, whereupon the surface land above…