City of Fairburn v. Cook

372 S.E.2d 245, 188 Ga. App. 58, 1988 Ga. App. LEXIS 879
CourtCourt of Appeals of Georgia
DecidedJuly 8, 1988
Docket76075, 76076, 76077, 76211, 76212
StatusPublished
Cited by29 cases

This text of 372 S.E.2d 245 (City of Fairburn v. Cook) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Georgia primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
City of Fairburn v. Cook, 372 S.E.2d 245, 188 Ga. App. 58, 1988 Ga. App. LEXIS 879 (Ga. Ct. App. 1988).

Opinions

Sognier, Judge.

James Cook brought suit against the City of Fairburn (the “City”), Atlanta and West Point Railroad Company (the “Railroad”), and numerous other defendants seeking damages stemming from a vehicular accident that left him a quadriplegic. The trial court granted summary judgment in favor of Thomas Moreland and Archie Burnham, two of the individual defendants, and with the exception of the City and the Railroad, the remaining parties were either voluntarily dismissed from the suit or granted summary judgment, and are no longer involved in this case. Upon trial of the suit, the jury returned a verdict in favor of Cook for $2.5 million, the sum to be shared equally between the City and the Railroad. The five appeals and cross-appeals from this case are consolidated herein.

Appellee and his co-worker, Keith Smith, were heading home in Smith’s truck along State Route 92 (also known as Campbellton Road), having completed delivery of a lawn mower, when Smith drove the truck under a bridge owned by the Railroad into the intersection of State Route 92 and East Broad Street in the City. A “signal ahead” sign was situated before the bridge; a center traffic light suspended over the intersection by wire and corner signal lights mounted on posts controlled the flow of traffic through the intersection. Smith testified he did not see the “signal ahead” sign and did not see any of the traffic lights at the intersection itself. It is uncontroverted that the truck driven by Smith entered the intersection against the controlling red light, whereupon the truck was hit and appellee received the injury that left him a quadriplegic. The accident occurred on June 19, 1978; appellee was hospitalized until September 15, 1978.

[59]*59 76211, 76212. Atlanta & West Point Railroad Company v. Cook; and vice versa.

The Railroad contends the trial court erred by denying its motion for judgment notwithstanding the verdict, in that there was no issue for jury determination in regard to the two bases of recovery asserted by appellee against it, negligence and nuisance. We agree and reverse.

1. Appellee’s negligence theory of recovery was premised on a breach of the Railroad’s duty of ordinary care owed appellee as a member of the public by the Railroad’s creation and maintenance of a dangerous condition, i.e., the Railroad’s bridge. Appellee asserted that the location, design and configuration of the Railroad’s bridge obstructed the driving public’s view of the traffic signals, thereby creating a dangerous condition.

The evidence adduced at trial showed that the Railroad constructed the bridge in 1917, replacing a grade crossing on Campbellton Road which led into the pre-existing intersection. The height and width of the underpass was sufficient to allow the unimpeded flow of traffic. The traffic signals controlling the flow of traffic into the intersection were first introduced in the 1950’s. The evidence was uncontroverted that the Railroad had nothing whatsoever to do with the installation or positioning of the traffic signals.

The Railroad correctly points out that the installation and maintenance of traffic control devices is a statutorily regulated matter, see OCGA § 32-6-50, long acknowledged as a governmental function, see Englander v. City of East Point, 135 Ga. App. 487 (218 SE2d 161) (1975), and that the Railroad is statutorily prohibited from installing traffic control devices on its own. See OCGA §§ 40-6-25 (a); 32-6-51 (a). Nothing in OCGA § 32-6-197, cited by appellee, places any duty on a railroad regarding the installation or maintenance of traffic control devices in the area around a railroad underpass. That statute merely references a railroad’s duty to maintain the underpass itself, and exempts the railroad from maintaining even the “lighting, drainage, and pavement of the public roads thereunder. . . .” OCGA § 32-6-197 (c).

The pleadings and evidence at trial established that no dangerous condition was created or maintained by the mere existence of the bridge itself. Rather, the dangerous condition asserted by appellee was created by the installation and maintenance of traffic signals in positions where view of the lights was obscured by the bridge’s preexisting structure. Since the duty to install and maintain traffic' control devices is placed exclusively in the government, we cannot agree with appellee’s argument that the Railroad can nevertheless be held liable for obscuring a public road, i.e., the traffic signals, when the Railroad was statutorily prohibited from exercising any control over [60]*60those signals in order to rectify the dangerous condition and when evidence establishes that the structure of the bridge itself created no danger to appellee. The cases appellee cites for the proposition that a private property owner can be held liable for obscuring a public road are thus factually inapposite from the case sub judice in that the items obscuring the plaintiffs’ view of the public road were improperly positioned. Reliable Transfer Co. v. May, 70 Ga. App. 613 (29 SE2d 187) (1944) (truck illegally parked obscured the view of intersection); McKinney & Co. v. Lawson, 180 Ga. App. 550 (349 SE2d 763) (1986) (overgrown tree obstructed public pathway); Pollard v. Cartwright, 60 Ga. App. 630 (4 SE2d 693) (1939) and Callaway v. Pickard, 68 Ga. App. 637, 642-643 (2) (23 SE2d 564) (1942) (obscured view of on-coming trains stated as explanation of why plaintiffs could not see the train, and as descriptive of the locality and environment of the crossing, rather than as allegations of negligence).

The standards for granting a motion for judgment n.o.v. are the same as those governing the direction of a verdict. The motion may be granted only when, without weighing the credibility of the evidence, there can be but one reasonable conclusion as to the proper judgment. Johnston v. Bill Fancher & Assoc., 179 Ga. App. 67, 68 (345 SE2d 144) (1986). Because the Railroad breached no duty owed appellee in that it neither created nor maintained the dangerous condition that gave rise to appellee’s injury, a verdict for the Railroad on the issue of negligence was demanded and the trial court erred by denying the Railroad’s motion for judgment n.o.v. Id. at 69.

2. Appellee’s remaining claim against the Railroad was based on the premise that the 1917 bridge was constructed in the public right-of-way and thus, as an unauthorized structure under OCGA §§ 32-6-1 and 32-6-51 (b), the bridge was a public nuisance. See Smith v. Hiawassee Hardware Co., 167 Ga. App. 70 (305 SE2d 805) (1983). Resolution of this issue, therefore, turns on the extent of the public right-of-way acquired by the public from the Railroad.

Appellee asserts that the public right-of-way over the grade level crossing of the Railroad’s train tracks on Campbellton Road (State Route 92) extended to the heavens prior to the Railroad’s construction of its bridge in 1917, and thus the bridge, as erected and maintained, occupies physical space “used” by the public so as to place it in the public right-of-way.

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Bluebook (online)
372 S.E.2d 245, 188 Ga. App. 58, 1988 Ga. App. LEXIS 879, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/city-of-fairburn-v-cook-gactapp-1988.