The Columbus Consolidated Government has sued Norfolk Southern and other railroad companies to recover land the city argues the companies agreed 175 years ago to return.
Page, Scrantom, Sprouse, Tucker & Ford, the Columbus law firm representing CCG in the case, filed the complaint Aug. 28 in Superior Court of Muscogee County. The defendants are:
- Norfolk Southern Corp
- .Norfolk Southern Railway Company
- Central of Georgia Railway Company
- The South-Western Rail Road Company
- Genesee & Wyoming Railroad Services
- Columbus & Chattahoochee Railroad
- Georgia Southwestern Railroad.
CCG is demanding a jury trial. No dollar amount is specified in the lawsuit, but CCG seeks damages related to the companies’ use of the property, repossession of the property and a permanent injunction against the railroads from “continuing its trespass on CCG’s property.”
In 1847, the railroads requested land from the city for a depot, according to the complaint, and the city agreed, in cooperation with the State of Georgia, because of the benefits a passenger depot would provide to Columbus citizens…