More Cambie Street merchants file lawsuit over Canada Line

[whatnext]

Originally Posted by CanSpice

The cases didn't win because of a loss of sales. Those cases had been thrown out of court earlier. These cases won because the construction caused a drop in property value.

Nope:

..Leonard Schein, owner of Park Theatre; Gary Gautam, owner of Cambie General Store; and Dale Dubberley, owner of Thai Away Home argued that the cut-and-cover tunnelling that ripped up a section of Cambie Street for three years greatly restricted access to their businesses and ate into their revenue.

“I can find nothing in the evidence to suggest that the loss of profitability in fiscal 2007 and 2008 was due to any other factor than the work,” Justice Christopher Grauer wrote in his judgment. “What made the construction intolerable, resulting in unreasonable interference, was the extended time over which access was restricted.”

Schein told court that Park Theatre profits dropped significantly during construction. His net income was $110,282 for fiscal year 2006, but dropped to $11,737 in 2007, $13,577 in 2008 and $26,759 in 2009.

TransLink has been ordered to pay Schein $128,880, Dubberley $44,560 and Gautam $7,600...
https://vancouversun.com/news/local-...e-construction

[CanSpice]

Originally Posted by whatnext

Nope:

..Leonard Schein, owner of Park Theatre; Gary Gautam, owner of Cambie General Store; and Dale Dubberley, owner of Thai Away Home argued that the cut-and-cover tunnelling that ripped up a section of Cambie Street for three years greatly restricted access to their businesses and ate into their revenue.

“I can find nothing in the evidence to suggest that the loss of profitability in fiscal 2007 and 2008 was due to any other factor than the work,” Justice Christopher Grauer wrote in his judgment. “What made the construction intolerable, resulting in unreasonable interference, was the extended time over which access was restricted.”

Schein told court that Park Theatre profits dropped significantly during construction. His net income was $110,282 for fiscal year 2006, but dropped to $11,737 in 2007, $13,577 in 2008 and $26,759 in 2009.

TransLink has been ordered to pay Schein $128,880, Dubberley $44,560 and Gautam $7,600...
https://vancouversun.com/news/local-...e-construction

The actual ruling disagrees with you. I mean, it even says:

The plaintiffs acknowledge that a loss of revenue or business is not claimable as damage from injurious affection...

There's also a whole section about how each of the three parties had their value of leasehold interest (essentially the rent they could charge) assess for each of the years in question, and how that amount went down over the timeframe in question. It's not about how much the actual business lost (or, in legal words, "injury to business or trade"), it's how much the "injury to the land" was.

[deasine]

...Adding to that, there were two different methods that were debated in court as to how "injury to land" was to be calculated. Ultimately, the judge sided with the plaintiff's approach as being more "preferable and more likely to create a realistic result," and that this approach (in concept) had the support of previous cases before it.

From the court case:

The plaintiffs, then, would measure the loss in the value of the leasehold interest by calculating the effect of the construction (the “works”) on the rental value of their properties. They would do so by applying the percentage by which profits were reduced over the time in question to the base rent payable over the same time under their leases. If profits were reduced by 60%, then, the plaintiffs argue, the loss in the value of the leasehold interest is properly measured at 60% of the base rent.