The Texas Supreme Court on Friday announced granting a review of a Leon County landowner’s lawsuit against Texas Central’s high speed electric passenger train project.
Oral arguments have been set for January 11, 2022 in the ongoing lawsuit filed by James Miles, who according to the summary published by the Texas Supreme Court “challenged Texas Central’s eminent domain authority after the company attempted to survey Miles’ property along the proposed route of the railway.”
Miles went to the supreme court after a court of appeals in Corpus Christi overturned a trial judge in Leon County who ruled in his favor.
The summary provided by the Texas Supreme Court stated “Miles argues that Texas Central is not operating a railroad because it has not taken crucial steps toward operation, such as laying track or running cars.”
The summary also states “Likewise, Miles says that Texas Central is not an “interurban electric railway” because the Legislature did not intend to include large high-speed railways within the statutory definition.”
And the summary brings up the eminent domain case of Texas Rice Land Partners, LTD. v. Denbury Green Pipeline-Texas, LLC, 363 S.W.3d 192, 198, 202 (Tex. 2012). The summary states “Miles argues that the Denbury decision requires entities show a reasonable probability that a project will be completed before obtaining eminent domain power.”
