Bradford, J.
Case Summary
The City of Carmel used its power of eminent domain to convert the intersection of Keystone Avenue and 96th Street into a roundabout interchange (“the Project”). Barham Investments, LLC (“Barham”), owns a car dealership, whose main entrance was on Threel Road, near the intersection that Carmel needed to acquire to complete the Project. In April of 2018, the trial court entered an agreed order of appropriation and appointment of appraisers (“the Agreed Order”). Barham considered the appraisers’ valuation of the Property to be too low because the taking allegedly extinguished its easement in Threel Road.
In January of 2021, Carmel moved for partial summary judgment arguing that Barham was not entitled to compensation for its loss of access to Threel Road, which motion the trial court denied. In May of 2022, after a jury trial, the jury awarded Barham $2.4 million in damages. Carmel moved to correct error, for new trial, or for remittitur. The trial court denied Carmel’s motions and Carmel appealed, raising multiple issues, including whether the trial court had erred in denying its partial-summary-judgment motion. Because we find that issue dispositive, and because Barham did not have a cognizable interest in Threel Road at the time, we reverse and remand with instructions to grant Carmel partial summary judgment on this issue. [Footnote omitted.]
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Carmel argues that it “did not in this case acquire Threel Road or an easement in Threel Road”; consequently, this case should be controlled by the traffic-flow rule and the trial court erred in leaving the question of whether there had been the loss of an easement for the jury. Appellant’s Br. p. 26. For its part, Barham argues that the trial court properly denied Carmel’s motion for summary judgment because this case involves an easement and a substantial change in how the Property is used. We agree with Carmel that it did not acquire Barham’s easement in this case and, even if it had, Barham’s easement granted it only a right to ingress and egress over Threel Road—not to a curb cut on Threel Road—and the interference is neither substantial nor material.
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In any event, however, Carmel appropriated Threel Road—the servient estate—in the County Line Action. In the County Line Action, the trial court granted Carmel, among other things, “the total acquisition of Threel Road[,]” causing “Threel Road [to] be permanently closed as a result of the Project.” Appellant’s App. Vol. VIII pp. 85–86. With its total acquisition of Threel Road, Carmel acquired all the interests in Threel Road, including Barham’s easement that it had received from the County Line Realty Company. [Footnote omitted.]
While Indiana case law appears silent on the issue, other authorities have held that the taking of real property by eminent domain extinguishes any easements burdening the property…
In a similar vein, we have previously held that the exercise of eminent domain extinguished the reversionary interest in a deed, because such a “restriction cannot be enforced against the condemning authority as long as that entity’s use is for a public purpose; the only remedy for a violation of that restriction is monetary compensation.” Jensen v. City of New Albany, 868 N.E.2d 525, 529 (Ind. Ct. App. 2007). We conclude that Carmel extinguished Barham’s easement in Threel Road when it acquired Threel Road in its entirety in the County Line Action; therefore, there was no easement to take in the current case. Having established that there was no easement at the time of Carmel’s acquisition in this case, we now turn our attention to the ingress-egress and traffic-flow rules.
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The judgment of the trial court is reversed, and we remand with instructions for to grant Carmel partial summary judgment on this issue.
May, J., and Mathias, J., concur.