CSX Faces Revived Claims Stemming From Lumberton, N.C., Flooding

CSX Transportation Inc. must face revived claims by would-be classes of Lumberton, N.C., businesses and residents whose properties were flooded during Hurricanes Matthew and Florence, the Fourth Circuit ruled.

The plaintiffs, who lived and worked in flood-prone areas, plausibly alleged they were third-party beneficiaries of an agreement that allows the city to forestall flooding by barricading a levee system gap created by a railroad underpass, the court said Tuesday. The plaintiffs say the railroad breached its obligations under that agreement.

But federal law bars the plaintiffs’ tort-based claims alleging the railroad should have should have operated, maintained, and constructed its ...