## Facts

- Peter and Elizabeth Carlino owned a home directly across Stenton Avenue from a 47-acre tract later developed into a multi-family residential complex.
- The tract was rezoned from single-family to multi-family after a hearing at which the then-owner stipulated to a 300-foot buffer from Stenton Avenue and that no access road to Stenton Avenue would be built.
- Whitpain Township adopted the rezoning in 1973.
- Whitpain Investors later acquired the tract and, in 1979, began constructing an access road from the complex to Stenton Avenue adjacent to the Carlino property.
- The Carlinos learned the Township-approved land development plan included Stenton Avenue access and that PennDOT had issued a driveway permit in 1978 authorizing that access.
- The Carlinos alleged the access road would cause inconvenience and annoyance and reduce their property value, and they sought to enforce the earlier stipulation as a binding condition of rezoning.

## Issues

1. Whether neighboring landowners have standing to seek injunctive relief to enforce a rezoning stipulation between a municipality and a landowner restricting access to a public road.
2. Whether a rezoning-hearing stipulation created an enforceable contract right or covenant running with the land that neighboring landowners could enforce against the municipality and a subsequent developer.

## Decision

- The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania affirmed dismissal of the complaint after preliminary objections in the nature of a demurrer were sustained.
- Accepting the complaint’s well-pleaded facts as true, the Court held the Carlinos lacked standing because they asserted no legally cognizable private right distinct from the public’s interest in roadway access and traffic conditions.
- The Court held the rezoning stipulation did not create a privately enforceable contract or property interest in favor of the Carlinos, and thus did not support injunctive relief against the developer, the Township, or PennDOT.

## Legal Principles

- On review of a demurrer, courts accept well-pleaded factual allegations as true but dismiss if the facts do not establish a legally enforceable claim.
- Standing to seek equitable relief requires a legally protectable interest; generalized harms associated with public regulatory decisions do not, without more, confer standing on private parties.
- Stipulations made during a legislative rezoning process are public regulatory conditions and do not become privately enforceable contracts or covenants in favor of neighbors absent a clear, legally recognized private property right (e.g., a recorded restrictive covenant, easement, or comparable instrument).
- Management of access to public roads and enforcement of zoning-related conditions generally rests with public authorities unless the law grants a private enforcement right.

## Conclusion

The court held that neighboring homeowners could not use equity to enforce a rezoning-related stipulation restricting access to a public road because the asserted interest was public in character and the stipulation did not create a private contract or property right enforceable by the neighbors.


Carlino v. Whitpain Invs., 453 A.2d 1385 (Pa. 1982)