Hurd v. Williamsburg County

579 S.E.2d 136, 353 S.C. 596, 2003 S.C. App. LEXIS 41
CourtCourt of Appeals of South Carolina
DecidedMarch 17, 2003
Docket3614
StatusPublished
Cited by23 cases

This text of 579 S.E.2d 136 (Hurd v. Williamsburg County) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of South Carolina primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Hurd v. Williamsburg County, 579 S.E.2d 136, 353 S.C. 596, 2003 S.C. App. LEXIS 41 (S.C. Ct. App. 2003).

Opinions

ANDERSON, J.:

Jack Hurd brought this tort action against Williamsburg County and Williamsburg County Transit Authority (collectively referred to as the “County”), alleging damages resulting from an automobile-pedestrian collision that occurred when he was struck by an automobile after exiting a bus. A jury trial was held and Hurd was awarded $675,000 in damages. The verdict was reduced under the mandate of the South Carolina Tort Claims Act. The County appeals. We affirm.

[603]*603 FACTSIPROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

Hurd boarded the County’s bus around 6 a.m. on February 1,1996 to go to work in Myrtle Beach. The bus driver usually drove another route, but was substituting for the regular driver that day. The bus route starts in the Sand Ridge Community, travels through Highway 261 to Highway 24, comes down to Highway 41/51 at Mingo’s crossing, then goes through Georgetown and Highway 17 to Myrtle Beach.

On the morning of the accident, the bus driver pulled off onto the shoulder of Highway 41, a two-lane road, after several passengers requested he stop there so that they could get breakfast across the road at Mingo’s Store. The normal procedure was for the bus driver to stop further down at the “Park and Ride,” which is located on the same side of the road as Mingo’s Store. The “Park and Ride” was erected by the County to serve as a transfer station for riders because of the congestion in the Highway 41 area.

After several passengers alighted onto the shoulder, Hurd, who had been sleeping, awoke and asked the bus driver to let him off so that he could also go to Mingo’s store. According to the bus driver, he informed Hurd he was going to the “Park and Ride” and that Hurd could disembark there and go to Mingo’s. Hurd, however, requested to go with the other passengers.

Hurd exited and walked to the rear of the bus. At trial, he claimed he looked to the left and right and did not see any vehicles on the highway. He stated he began to cross the highway when the bus started to pull away and was at an angle so he could not see to his right. Hurd continued across the highway and was struck by a car coming from the opposite direction. Hurd asserted: “I tried to look around the day that I got hit and my view was blocked, that’s why I go [sic] hit.” Hurd sustained substantial injuries as a result of being hit.

Booker Pressley, a former director of the County’s transit authority, testified that the “Park and Ride” on Highway 41 was built because of the traffic congestion in the area and concern about rider safety. Pressley contended that the transit authority had a policy that the drivers were to let the passengers off at the “Park and Ride.” Pressley maintained he issued a written warning to the bus driver following the [604]*604accident for failing to discharge the passengers at the “Park and Ride.” At his deposition, published to the jury, he declared:

Q. After the establishment of the Park & Ride were the drivers advised that they weren’t to use the shoulder of the road to discharge passengers anymore, that they were to use the Park & Ride?
A. We had meetings and the meetings were that every driver would meet down at Mingo’s and get down there between the time of a quarter to seven and twenty minutes to seven so they could make their change of the bus. We also talked about you know, it was [sic] thing where we talk about everybody pulling up over there. When we went in there that was a woods area. We were able to get a whole side cleaned up to the store so the passengers wouldn’t have to cross the road.
Q. Were the drivers told not to discharge the passengers on the side of the road after the Park & Ride was created?
A. I think every driver was told, and somehow I think they — now, if they was [sic] doing it I didn’t know anything about it. Because I used to go down there quite a few times and monitor that because we have some sites in Williamsburg County that’s creeping fast. What I mean is there’s a lot of traffic and it comes in until you kind of, you know it shoots right up on you.
Q. You were monitoring this area to make sure the drivers weren’t discharging passengers on the side of 41?
A. I monitored all areas, Myrtle Beach and all the areas.
Q. Is safety a consideration when letting a passenger off the bus?
A. Yes.
Q. In what way?
A. Well, again, just like I said Mingo’s is one of those little areas that- was congested and that’s why we started. What we did was we started a Park & Ride site in the congested area first.
[605]*605Q. Do you agree that the different discharge areas involve different risks?
A. Yes.
Q. And would you agree that some areas are safer than others?
A. Yes.
Q. Would you agree that the Park & Ride area established behind Mingo’s store is a safer area to discharge passengers than on the side of the highway?
A. Yes.
Q. Do you have any knowledge about accident or fatalities occurring at that intersection?
A. Well, Mingo’s when I first started the transit, they had a stop sign there. Since then I think they had a coupe [sic] of deaths from, not people with transit, but other just drivers. Now they have a blinking red light there. I don’t know what has happened but that has always been one of those areas and by me living there I know it because it’s an area that serves a lot of log trucks and trucks and if you’re a driver a lot of times you see truck and you see one you don’t know how many, or you don’t how — you don’t — strike that — you don’t know what’s behind it so that was one of the areas that I always had a lot of concern about and one of the reasons I said that I thought he was blessed so much. When we first went out there we started to — we used to let people off on the side and we was [sic] able to get that property to get over there.
Q. Was that a factor in getting the property, were you looking for a safer place to discharge people?
A. That was the right place. That was the place. That was the ideal place. People wanted to use the store and we wanted to have a place where we had a bus coming in from Hemmingway and we had a bus coming in from Morrisville and one coming in from Neesmith all coming in to the same port.
[606]*606Q. My question was, did he violate a policy of the transit authority by discharging passengers on the side of Highway 41 rather than using the Park & Ride?
A. Well, I guess, like I said when we put up the site there was no question about it that the site was there for the use of getting us off the road. Because we didn’t just put up a site we created a piece of land and went in there and cleaned up that woods between the store and the Park and Ride site, it’s clean to that store. We brought it over there because we didn’t want people crossing the road.

Dr.

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Hurd v. Williamsburg County
579 S.E.2d 136 (Court of Appeals of South Carolina, 2003)

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Bluebook (online)
579 S.E.2d 136, 353 S.C. 596, 2003 S.C. App. LEXIS 41, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/hurd-v-williamsburg-county-scctapp-2003.