N.J. Stat. tit. 48, ch. 5

in effect

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-1 § 48:5-1

Five or more persons, a majority of whom shall be residents of this state, may form a company for the purpose of constructing, maintaining and operating a bridge or bridges and approaches thereto for the public use.

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-2 Certificate of incorporation; contents

Such persons shall execute a certificate of incorporation setting forth: I. The name of the company; II. The period of time the same is to continue; III. The name of each county through or into which the bridge or bridges are to be constructed, maintained and operated; IV. The amount of authorized capital stock of the company, which shall not be less than twenty thousand dollars for every bridge constructed or proposed to be constructed, and the number of shares of such capital stock; and V. The names and places of residence of the incorporators.

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-3 § 48:5-3

The certificate of incorporation shall be recorded in the office of the clerk of the county where the principal office of the company is located, and filed and recorded in the office of the secretary of state. Thereafter the incorporators and their successors shall be a corporation by the name certified in the certificate of incorporation.

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-4 § 48:5-4

Any certificate of incorporation filed in the office of the secretary of state pursuant to section 48:5-3 of this title, or a copy thereof certified by the secretary of state, shall be evidence of the incorporation of the company and of the facts therein stated.

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-5 § 48:5-5

A board of at least five directors of every company organized under this article shall be chosen annually by the stockholders, when, where, and as shall be provided by the by-laws and shall hold office for one year, and until others are chosen and qualified in their stead. The other officers of the company shall be selected and chosen and shall hold office as provided by the by-laws.

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-6 § 48:5-6

The stock of every company organized under this article shall be subscribed, paid for, held and transferred, and the subscriptions therefor collected in the manner set forth in Title 14, Corporations, General.

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-7 General powers

Every company organized under this article shall have power: I. To lay out a bridge or bridges with the proper approaches and to construct the same, and for the purposes of cuttings and embankments to take as much more land as may be necessary for the proper construction, maintenance, operation and security of such bridge or bridges. No bridge shall exceed 50 feet in width unless more land shall be required for the slopes of cuts and embankments; II. To construct suspension drawbridges over any channels, thoroughfares or small creeks or rivers, but no such company shall build a bridge over any fresh water creek or river which is more than 400 feet wide; III. To take and hold such voluntary grants of real estate and other property as may be necessary for the construction, maintenance and accommodation of its bridge or bridges; IV. To purchase, hold and use such real estate or other property as may be necessary to accomplish the objects of its incorporation; V. To enter upon all lands or waters to explore, survey, and locate the route of any such bridge, with the proper approaches and necessary buildings, appurtenances, and conveniences, doing no unnecessary injury to private or other property, and subject to responsibility for all damages which shall be done thereto; VI. To condemn and take land necessary for its business, in accordance with chapter 1 of the Title Eminent Domain (s. 20:1-1 et seq.); VII. To borrow such sums of money from time to time not to exceed in the whole the amount of its capital stock, as shall be necessary to build, construct, maintain and repair and keep in repair any such bridges with the necessary approaches, and to secure the repayment thereof by the execution, negotiation and sale of bonds secured by mortgages on its property and franchises; VIII. In the manner or mode of procedure and with the effect and subject to the restrictions and liabilities prescribed by Title 14, Corporations, General, and as fully and completely as a corporation organized under said Title 14, to purchase, take by devise or bequest, hold and convey real and personal property, inside or outside of this State, and mortgage any such real or personal property, and its franchises, to sell or exchange all or substantially all of its property and assets, including its good will, to lease its property and franchises to any other corporation or to any person, individual, partnership or public body, to purchase and dispose of the stock of any other corporation and pay therefor, to enter into, effect and carry out a joint agreement with any other corporation or with any person, individual, partnership or public body for their merger or consolidation, and to dissolve or be dissolved and be wound up. The powers and privileges conferred upon any such company and described in subparagraph VIII of this section shall be vested in such company and may be fully and completely exercised by it at its discretion notwithstanding any restriction, limitation, condition or other provision in this article contained or implied, but in the event of conveyance or mortgage of any bridge constructed by such company or the sale or exchange of all or substantially all of its property and assets or the effecting and carrying out of a joint agreement with any other corporation or corporations for their merger or consolidation or the dissolution and winding up of such company, any person, individual, partnership, corporation or public body thereby acquiring such bridge or otherwise succeeding to the rights, privileges, powers and franchises of such company with respect to such bridge (hereinafter called "successor" ) and the successor's right, title and interest in and to such bridge shall be subject to and governed by all of the restrictions, limitations, conditions or other provisions in this article contained or implied and such successor, be he or it a person, individual, partnership, corporation or public body, shall be subject to and governed by this section and sections 48:5-8 to 48:5-12, inclusive, of this article. IX. To exercise all other powers hereby granted or now or hereafter lawfully granted such corporations. Amended by L.1966, c. 197, s. 1, eff. July 21, 1966.

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-8 Tolls

Every company organized under this article may take such rate of toll as may be fixed by it from time to time, for persons, vehicles or animals, or for things not herein enumerated, entering on, passing over or using such bridges and the approaches thereto. Any toll gatherer of the company may stop any person, vehicle or animal from entering upon, passing over or using such bridges and the approaches thereto until the required toll shall have been paid.

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-8.1 § 48:5-8.1

If the charter of any company organized under this article shall hereafter become or shall have heretofore become inoperative or void by proclamation of the governor or by operation of law, for nonpayment of taxes, the governor, by and with the advice of the attorney general, may, upon payment by such company to the secretary of state of such sum in lieu of taxes and penalties as to them may seem reasonable, but in no case to be less than the fees required as upon the filing of the original certificate of incorporation, permit such company to be reinstated and entitled to all its franchises and privileges. Upon such payment as aforesaid the secretary of state shall issue his certificate entitling such company to continue its said business and its said franchises. Nothing in this section contained shall relieve any such company from the penalty of forfeiture of its franchises in case of failure to pay such future taxes imposed under any law of this state.

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-9 § 48:5-9

Whenever two or more bridge companies are authorized by any lawful authority to build and maintain bridges over or across navigable waters separating this state from another state and the lines of the bridges may or can embrace the same location or line or their locations or lines may or can connect or become tributary to each other, such companies may enter into an agreement for the joint or several building, maintenance or operation of the whole or any part of the bridges together with all proper connections and appurtenances and approaches thereto and stations.

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-10 Terms of joint agreement

The directors of the companies proposing to enter into such joint agreement may agree upon the terms thereof and the agreement may prescribe the terms and conditions thereof and the mode of carrying it into effect. The parties to the agreement may pledge to and with each other for the due performance thereof, all their present and future acquired property and franchises. They may prescribe such provisions relating to the issue of obligations by either or both companies and the securing of the same by guarantee or mortgage of the franchises and property of either or both companies, present or future acquired and relating to the ownership, possession, control, maintenance and operation of the whole or any part of such bridge, its connections, appurtenances, approaches and stations by the respective companies or by their respective stockholders, directors, committees, officers or agents, or by any board of managers or arbitrators appointed under the agreement, as may be proper to effect the objects thereof.

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-11 Stockholders' meeting; filing agreement

The agreement shall be submitted to the stockholders of each company at a meeting called specially for the purpose. Written or printed notice of the time and place of the meeting shall be delivered or mailed by each company to its stockholders of record whose post-office addresses are known to the company, at least thirty days before the meeting and a general notice thereof shall also be published daily for at least four weeks in a newspaper printed in the city, town or county where the company has its principal office or place of business. At the meeting, a vote by ballot shall be taken for the adoption or rejection of the agreement, each share entitling the holder thereof to one vote. The ballot shall be cast in person or by proxy. If two-thirds of the votes of all the stockholders of the respective companies shall be for the adoption of the agreement, that fact shall be certified thereon by the secretary of each company under its seal. The agreement so adopted or a certified copy thereof shall be filed in the office of the secretary of state and shall from thence be deemed and taken to be the agreement of the companies. The secretary of state shall be paid twenty dollars upon filing the agreement. A copy of the agreement duly certified by the secretary of state shall be evidence of the existence thereof and that the provisions of this section have been complied with.

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-12 § 48:5-12

Every bridge company incorporated by the laws of this state and doing business, operating works or owning property in this state or partly in this state and partly in another state, and whose charter or the supplements thereto do not confer an express power to mortgage or convey in trust its corporate rights and franchises to secure its bonds, may mortgage its corporate property, rights and franchises to secure the payment of any bonds or other indebtedness issued or to be issued by the company, but such indebtedness shall not exceed by more than fifty thousand dollars the amount of real and personal property which the company may be authorized by its charter to hold.

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-13 § 48:5-13

Three or more persons may form a company for the purpose of constructing, maintaining and operating a bridge or bridges over the Delaware river for public use, upon executing and filing a certificate of incorporation as hereinafter provided.

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-14 Certificate of incorporation; contents

The certificate of incorporation shall set forth: I. The name of the company, which shall not resemble a name already in use by any corporation in this state so as to lead to uncertainty or confusion; II. The location (town or city, street and number, if such there be) of the principal office in this state; III. The name of its agent in charge of the principal office upon whom service of process may be made; IV. The object of the company, the municipality in which the terminal points of the proposed bridge or bridges are to be located, the counties of this state in or through which the company intends to construct such bridge or bridges; V. The amount of total authorized capital stock, or total number of shares of stock authorized; the number of shares into which the same is divided, if it is to have a par value; a statement of whether such shares are to have a par value or to be without par value; if the shares are to have a par value, the par value of each share; the amount of capital stock subscribed by the incorporators, and with which it will commence business; and if there be more than one class of stock created by the certificate, a description of the different classes with the terms on which created; VI. The names and places of residence of the incorporators and the number of shares subscribed by each. The aggregate of such subscription shall be the amount of capital with which the company shall commence business; VII. The names and places of residence of the first directors of the company, of whom there shall be not less than three, who shall be stockholders and incorporators of the company, and at least one of whom shall be a resident of this state, and who shall manage its affairs until other directors are chosen in their places; VIII. The period, if any, limited for the duration of the company; IX. Any provisions authorized by law which the incorporators may choose to insert for the regulation of the business, and for conduct of the affairs of the corporation, or for creating, defining, limiting and regulating the powers of directors, stockholders and officers.

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-15 § 48:5-15

The certificate of incorporation shall be signed in person by all the incorporators and proved or acknowledged as required for deeds of real estate and recorded in the office of the clerk of the county where the principal office of the company shall be established. After being so recorded a copy thereof to be certified by the clerk shall be filed in the office of the secretary of state. Thereupon the incorporators and their successors shall be a corporation. The secretary of state shall record the certificate in a book to be kept for that purpose.

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-16 Conditions precedent to filing of certificate

The certificate of incorporation shall not be filed in the office of the secretary of state until there shall have been annexed thereto and filed therewith an affidavit, made by at least three of the directors in the certificate named, that at least one hundred thousand dollars has been, in good faith, subscribed and paid into the treasury of the company for stock for each terminal to be constructed by the company within this state, and that it is intended in good faith to construct, maintain and operate the bridges mentioned in the certificate. Nor shall the certificate be filed in such office until at least twenty-five thousand dollars has been in good faith subscribed and paid in cash to the directors for each terminal to be constructed in this state, and deposited by them with the treasurer of the state. The treasurer of the state shall hold the sum so deposited subject to be repaid to the company or its treasurer upon the construction of what it shall be proved to his satisfaction that the company has expended at least twenty-five thousand dollars to construct, or to be repaid to the directors of the company upon satisfactory proof of the payment of all debts of the company and the dissolution thereof.

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-17 § 48:5-17

Any certificate of incorporation filed in the office of the secretary of state in pursuance of section 48:5-15 of this title, or a copy thereof certified by the secretary of state, shall be evidence of the incorporation of the company and of the facts therein stated and of the right of the company to exercise all of its powers under the provisions of this article.

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-18 General powers

Every company incorporated, organized or existing under this article shall have power: Construction and maintaining bridges. a. To construct, maintain and operate its bridge or bridges. Surveys; entry on land. b. To locate and determine its route and works, and, for that purpose, to make such surveys and tests for its proposed bridge or bridges as may be necessary to the selection of the most advantageous location, and to enter upon lands and waters of any person, doing no unnecessary injury to private or other property, and subject to responsibility for all damages which shall be done thereto. Condemnation. c. Upon obtaining written permission of the board of public utility commissioners, to condemn and take the land necessary for its business, in accordance with chapter one of the Title Eminent Domain (s. 20:1-1 et seq.). Acquisition of real estate. d. To acquire from time to time and to hold, operate and use all such real estate and other property or any interest therein, and any existing ferry companies or the rights and properties thereof, or any interest therein as may, in the judgment of its directors, be necessary for the purpose of the construction, maintenance and operation of its bridges, or to accomplish the objects of its incorporation, and to sell land, rights or property thus acquired, when not necessary for such purposes and objects. Bonds and mortgages; usury as defense. e. To borrow such sums of money as shall be necessary to construct, improve, extend or repair its bridges, and to furnish all lands and other property necessary for its purposes, and for such purpose to issue and sell its bonds secured by mortgage on its lands, bridges, chattels, franchises and appurtenances. No such company shall plead any statute against usury in any action at law or in equity to enforce the payment of a bond or mortgage executed under the provisions of this section. In the case of any such company in this State, the amount of whose debts shall have been limited by special law, the written consent of the holders of at least two-thirds of all of who shall issue bonds of any such company to an amount greater than that its stock shall be obtained before any mortgage shall be executed. A person who shall issue bonds of any such company to an amount greater than that authorized by law shall be guilty of a misdemeanor. Where a mortgage on a bridge right of way and franchise includes chattels, it shall be sufficient notice and evidence thereof to record the same as a mortgage on real estate. Real and personal property; mortgages; sale or lease; stock of other corporations; successors' right. f. In the manner or mode of procedure and with the effect and subject to the restrictions and liabilities prescribed by Title 14, Corporations, General, and as fully and completely as a corporation organized under said Title 14, to purchase, take by devise or bequest, hold and convey real and personal property, inside or outside of this State, and mortgage any such real or personal property, and its franchises, to sell or exchange all or substantially all of its property and assets, including its good-will, to lease its property and franchises to any other corporation, to purchase and dispose of the stock of any other corporation and pay therefor, to enter into, effect and carry out a joint agreement with any other corporation or corporations for their merger or consolidation, and to dissolve or be dissolved and be wound up. The powers and privileges conferred upon any such company and described in subparagraph f of this section shall be vested in such company and may be fully and completely exercised by it at its discretion notwithstanding any restriction, limitation, condition or other provision in this article contained or implied, but in the event of conveyance or mortgage of any bridge constructed by such company or the sale or exchange of all or substantially all of its property and assets or the effecting and carrying out of a joint agreement with any other corporation or corporations for their merger or consolidation or the dissolution and winding up of such company, any person, partnership, corporation or public body thereby acquiring such bridge or otherwise succeeding to the rights, privileges, powers and franchises of such company with respect to such bridge (hereinafter called "successor" ) and the successor's right, title and interest in and to such bridge shall be subject to and governed by all of the restrictions, limitations, conditions or other provisions in this article contained or implied and such successor shall, for all the purposes of this section and sections 48:5-19 to 48:5-24, inclusive, of this article, be deemed to be a company incorporated, organized or existing under this article; provided, however, that if such successor be this State, or any county or municipality thereof, or any bridge commission, bridge authority, public officer, board, commission or agency or other public body, created by or in any such State, county or municipality, then and in such case (1) the power and privilege conferred by the provisions of section 48:5-19 of this article upon the company and any successor to demand and receive sums of money for the use of such bridge and for other services connected with such bridge shall cease and determine at the expiration of forty-five years after the opening of such bridge for public use, and in consideration thereof (2) such bridge and the necessary approaches and appurtenances thereto shall not be subject to acquisition by, or be subject to becoming the property of, any State or States, municipality or municipalities, under the terms and provisions of sections 48:5-22, 48:5-23 or 48:5-24 of this article, and the right, title and interest of such State, county, municipality, bridge commission, bridge authority, or public officer, board, commission, agency or body in and to such bridge shall be perpetual. Amended by L.1947, c. 401, p. 1264, s. 1.

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-19 Tolls

Every such company may demand and receive such sums of money for the use of its bridges and for other services connected with its business as it shall from time to time think reasonable and proper not exceeding: Vehicles including driver-- Motor cycle with or without side car, twenty-five cents. Automobiles, except trucks and busses, under one hundred-inch wheel base, forty cents; over one hundred-inch wheel base, sixty cents. Automobile trucks or busses under eleven feet in length, fifty cents; eleven feet and under fifteen feet in length, sixty-five cents; fifteen feet and under seventeen feet in length, eighty cents. Horse drawn vehicles--one-horse wagon, fifty cents; two-horse wagon, seventy-five cents; additional horses attached to vehicle, fifteen cents. Trailer on automobile or wagon, fifty cents. Each additional foot or part thereof over seventeen feet in length of all vehicles or loads thereof, five cents. Bicycle and rider, ten cents. Saddle horse and rider, fifteen cents. Each pedestrian or passenger in vehicle, five cents. Vehicles or means of transportation not above referred to or not now invented or used, at such rates as the company may fix.

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-20 § 48:5-20

Every bridge constructed under the provisions of this article may be used for the passage of vehicles of all types and kind; for the passage of pedestrians; for all incidental purposes, including conduits, cables, pipes, wires and railways, in so far as such use will not interfere with the passage of vehicles and pedestrians.

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-21 § 48:5-21

Every bridge constructed under the provisions of this article shall be kept open to the public at all times after it is completed except when necessarily closed for repairs, or when any draw of such bridge is necessarily open to permit the passage of water traffic.

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-22 Acquisition of bridge by states; terms of acquisition

The state reserves to itself the right, acting in conjunction with any adjoining state or municipality thereof, to acquire any bridge constructed by any such company at the following times and upon the following terms: a. At the expiration of five years after the opening of any bridge for public use, for the total costs thereof of whatever nature and upon assumption of all obligations or liabilities of the bridge company, for the construction of the bridge, with the approaches thereto and appurtenances thereof, plus fifteen per cent of the cost; b. At any time thereafter, at such total cost and upon assumption of such obligations or liabilities, plus fifteen per cent of the cost, less two per cent per annum of the total cost for each year after the expiration of five years from the date of the opening of the bridge for public use. Every company organized under this article consents to the acquisition by the state pursuant to this section of any bridge constructed by the company.

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-23 Acquisition of bridge by states; two or more bridges

If two or more bridges shall have been constructed by any such company at different times, the per cent of the total cost to be paid therefor shall be applied to each bridge as of the date the same shall have been opened for public use. The right to acquire two or more bridges under section 48:5-22 of this title may be exercised if any one of the bridges shall have been in operation for five years. If a second or other bridge shall not have been in operation for five years, then such second or other bridge shall be taken at such total cost thereof, plus fifteen per cent. If, at the time of the taking of such second or other bridge, it is in process of construction, it shall be acquired at the total cost of the construction up to the time of acquisition, plus fifteen per cent thereof, and upon assumption by the states of all obligations and liabilities incurred in such construction.

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-24 § 48:5-24

If the state, acting jointly with any adjoining state, shall not have purchased a bridge constructed by a company organized under this article at the expiration of fifty years after the opening of the bridge for public use, the bridge together with the necessary approaches and appurtenances shall become the property of such states for public use without cost or expense to the states and the right, title and interest of the company shall cease.

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-25 § 48:5-25

This article shall be liberally construed and no proceedings thereunder shall be set aside or invalidated by reason of any informality, unless substantial injustice would result therefrom.

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-26 Conviction of nuisance; taking toll without paying fine; penalty

When a corporation shall be convicted of a nuisance for not repairing and keeping in repair a bridge and shall neglect to pay the fine and costs awarded for the space of three months after execution shall have been issued against it, such corporation, its lessee or agent, or any other person shall not demand or take any toll upon such bridge until such fine and costs are paid. If any person shall so demand or take toll after notice in writing to him of such conviction and neglect, such person shall be punished by a penalty of one hundred dollars to be sued for in the name of the prosecutor of the pleas of the county and applied toward payment of the fine and costs aforesaid.

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-27 Investigation of toll bridges and fixing of rates

L.1913, c. 298, p. 614 (1924 Suppl. s.s. *167-18, *167-19), entitled "A supplement to an act entitled "An act concerning public utilities; to create a board of public utility commissioners and to prescribe its duties and powers,' approved April twenty-first, one thousand nine hundred and eleven," approved April ninth, one thousand nine hundred and thirteen, saved from repeal. [This act authorizes the board of public utility commissioners to investigate certain toll bridges, require them to be repaired if necessary and fix the toll charges thereof.]

N.J. Stat. § 48:5-28 Destruction or removal of materials of toll bridges; regulating passage over

L.1872, c. 85, p. 16 (Rev.1877, pp. 91, 92, s.s. 35 to 40; C.S. pp. 322, 323, s.s. 65 to 70), entitled "An act for the protection of bridges over the river Delaware," approved February twenty-eighth, one thousand eight hundred and seventy-two, saved from repeal. [This act prescribes penalties for destroying or removing timber or other materials belonging to toll bridges over the Delaware river, for crossing such bridges faster than a walk and for carrying fire, explosives, et cetera, over such bridges and requires vehicles to keep to the right while crossing. The act provided it was to go into effect when ratified by the legislature of the state of Pennsylvania and it was so ratified by Pennsylvania by the act of 1873, April 10, P.L. 69, s. 1.]

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