QUESTION OF FACT WHETHER WATER RUNOFF CONSTITUTED TRESPASS AND NUISANCE.
The Second Department, reversing Supreme Court, determined summary judgment should not have been granted to defendants in this action alleging trespass and nuisance caused by water runoff:
A landowner will not be liable for damages to abutting property caused by the flow of surface water due to improvements to his or her land, provided that the improvements were made in good faith to make the property fit for some rational use, and that the water was not drained onto the other property by artificial means, such as pipes and ditches … . …
… [P]laintiffs raised triable issues of fact … by adducing evidence, inter alia, that a gutter downspout located on the defendants’ property and a drainage pipe installed under the low point in the defendants’ new driveway diverted rainwater runoff onto the plaintiffs’ properties … . Biaglow v Elite Prop. Holdings, LLC, 2016 NY Slip Op 04373, 2nd Dept 6-8-16
REAL PROPERTY (QUESTION OF FACT WHETHER WATER RUNOFF CONSTITUTED TRESPASS AND NUISANCE)/TRESPASS (QUESTION OF FACT WHETHER WATER RUNOFF CONSTITUTED TRESPASS AND NUISANCE)/NUISANCE (QUESTION OF FACT WHETHER WATER RUNOFF CONSTITUTED TRESPASS AND NUISANCE)/WATER RUNOFF (QUESTION OF FACT WHETHER WATER RUNOFF CONSTITUTED TRESPASS AND NUISANCE)