Again, some highway surveyors have very little taste for rural
beauty, and show very poor judgment, and perhaps now and then a
little spite, in ploughing up the green grass by the roadside and
sometimes in front of houses. These evils can be remedied by every
town which will pass suitable by-laws upon the subject and see that
they are enforced. Such by-laws might provide that no one should be
allowed to deposit within the limits of the highway any stones,
brush, wood, rubbish, or other substance inconvenient to public
travel; that no one should be permitted to dig up and carry away any
loam or soil within the limits of the highway; and that no highway
surveyor should be allowed to dig or plough up the greensward in
front of any dwelling-house, or other building used in connection
therewith, without the written direction or consent of the
selectmen.
CHAPTER XIV.
USE OF HIGHWAYS BY ADJOINING OWNERS.
The owner of land adjoining a highway ordinarily owns to the middle of
the road; and while he has the same rights as the public therein, he
also has, in addition thereto, certain other rights incident to the
ownership of the land over which the road passes. When land is taken
for a highway, it is taken for all the present and prospective purposes
for which a public thoroughfare may properly be used, and the damages
to the owner of the land are estimated with reference to such use; but
the land can be used for no other purpose, and when the servitude
ceases the land reverts to him free from encumbrance. During the
continuance of the servitude he is entitled to use the land, subject to
the easement, for any and all purposes not incompatible with the public
enjoyment. If the legislature authorizes the addition of any new
servitude, essentially distinct from the ordinary use of a highway,
like an elevated railroad, then the land-owner is entitled to
additional compensation; for it cannot be deemed, in law, to have been
within the contemplation of the parties, at the time of the laying out
of the road, that it might be used for such new and additional
purposes. It has been held in New York, Illinois, and some of the
United States circuit courts, that the use of a highway for a telegraph
line will entitle such owner to additional compensation; but in the
recent case of Pierce _v._ Drew[65] the majority of our Supreme Court
decided that the erection of a telegraph line is not a new servitude
for which the land-owner is entitled to additional compensation.
[65] 136 Mass. 75.
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