People Ex Rel. Department of Public Works v. Ward

FRIEDMAN,

Defendants Ward are landowners who appeal from a judgment fixing damages in an eminent domain action. The suit was brought by the State Department of Public Works to acquire a triangular-shaped parcel of about six acres, leaving the Wards with 46.5 acres; to extinguish a permanent easement of access between the Wards' remaining land and the neighboring freeway (Interstate 5), which had been created by a 1951 agreement between the state and the Wards’ predecessors; providing the Wards, however, a right of access to a nearby county road in lieu of that easement. One of the issues in…