EDWIN WARFIELD, ESQ., GOVERNOR.

1085

SECTION 1. Be it enacted by the General Assembly of Mary-

land, That an additional section be added to Article 23 of the

Code of Public General Laws, title "Corporations," sub-title

"Railroad

"Railroad Companies," to follow Section 204, and to be known

Companies."

as Section 204A, and to read as follows :

204A. Every railroad company incorporated under the laws

Public high-

of this State shall have the right, wherever it considers that the

ways across

crossing of its tracks by a public highway is dangerous, to pro-

railroad

vide at its own cost and expense that the said public highway

tracks.

shall be carried across its tracks either overhead by a bridge

or under said tracks by a tunnel, and in order to construct such

new crossing said railroad company is empowered to exercise

the powers of condemnation, vested in it, for the purpose of

acquiring such additional property and rights as it may require

to construct the same. The bridge which said railroad com-

pany shall construct for an overhead crossing or the tunnel

for the undergrade crossing shall be at least twenty feet wide,

and the height of said tunnel from the surface of the roadway

through it shall not be less than fourteen feet ; and the grades

approaching said overhead or undergrade crossings shall not

be greater than a rise of six feet in the hundred. The said

"tunnel" used in this section to describe the undergrade cross-

ing may either be arched or the railroad tracks may be carried

across the public highway on a bridge, as the railroad com-

pany may elect. For constructing the approaches to said over-

head or undergrade crossings the railroad company may, at

its own expense, change the grade of the public highway to

be carried on said new crossing with the same rights and lia-

bilities as are now vested in the County Commissioners in

changing the grades of public highways. Whenever a railroad

company shall construct an overhead' or undergrade crossing

under the terms of this section, all grade crossings within six

hundred yards of the same may be closed by it and no new

crossing shall be opened within that distance of said overhead

or undergrade crossing; provided, that this prohibition as to

the maintenance and opening of grade crossings shall not ap-
ply to incorporated towns or villages of two thousand or more

Does not apply
to towns of

inhabitants, subject, however, to the consent of the County

and over 2000

Commissioners or municipal authorities of said counties and

inhabitants.

towns, and that all Acts or parts of Acts inconsistent with this

Act be and the same are hereby repealed.

SEC. 2. And be it enacted, That this Act shall take effect

from the date of its passage.

Approved April 12, 1904.