Sparks from Railways

Early railways used mechanisms and types of fuel which had a clear risk of causing harm to nearby property. The classic case is of nearby crops being set on fire. This caused a conflict between activities connected to the raising industrialisation and traditional land property. Such a conflict can be solved either in favour of railway companies or in favour of land owners, but the solutions vary from country to country and over time. Sometimes, in the same historical period different courts of the same country reach incompatible conclusions and doctrine and industry lament the lack of certainty. The variety of solutions also increases when we bear in mind that at the beginning of the period Italy and Germany were not unified, and the courts and legislatures of the different reigns followed different approaches.

One might think that in those countries where land is culturally more important, the conflict was to be solved in favour of landowners. And, conversely, where land property was not so important and the controlling interest was the expansion of the new technology of railway transportation, the conflict should have been solved in favour of railway companies. But this simplification does not fully explain why Prussia and Italy (at least in the initial period) followed a pro- landowners approach, whereas the English and the Spanish approach seem to have favoured the interests of the raising railway industry.