Home/Wisconsin Supreme Court/Uren v. Purity Dairy Co.

Uren v. Purity Dairy Co.

33 N.W.2d 213, 252 Wis. 446, 1948 Wisc. LEXIS 332
CourtWisconsin Supreme Court
DecidedFebruary 16, 1948
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 33 N.W.2d 213 (Uren v. Purity Dairy Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Wisconsin Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Uren v. Purity Dairy Co., 33 N.W.2d 213, 252 Wis. 446, 1948 Wisc. LEXIS 332 (Wis. 1948).

Opinions

Rosenberry, C. J.

The trial of this case was lengthy and exhaustive. It would serve no good purpose to attempt a complete statement of the facts, and we shall refer only to such facts as are necessary to an understanding of the decision.

On the trial the jury found Robert Polkinghorn, the driver of the Dairy Company milk truck, causally negligent in the following particulars:

(a) With respect to keeping a**proper lookout.
(b) With respect to traveling at an excessive rate of speed in view of the road conditions then existing.
(c) With respect to keeping his truck under control.
*452 (d) With respect to driving his truck on the right-hand side of the traveled portion of the road and not yielding one half thereof to the other car.

With respect to (a), (b), and (c) we find no evidence in the record sustaining the answers to these questions. Substantially all of the evidence in respect to these matters was the testimony of Polkinghorn himself. From the evidence it appears that he was traveling at approximately twenty miles an hour, which was the speed of at least four other automobiles traveling upon the same highway at or about the same time and under approximately the same conditions. As to lookout, he had lowered the window of the cab and had his head out of the window looking at the roadway and at the snowbank on the .south side so that the platform of his truck would not strike it. He saw everything that there was to see, including the approaching car of Weinbrenner at a distance of one hundred feet. He had his truck under control. There is no evidence of any failure of duty in that respect.

Whether the evidence sustains the finding of the jury in regard to the place where he was driving his truck and his failure to yield one half of the right y>f way to the other car, requires more consideration.

Sec. 85.15 (1), Stats., provides:

“Upon all highways of sufficient width, except upon one-way highways, the operator of a vehicle shall operate the same upon the right half of the roadway.”

Sec. 85.15 (4), Stats., provides:

“Operators of vehicles proceeding in opposite directions shall pass each other to the right, each giving the other at least one half of the main-traveled portion of the roadway as nearly as possible.”

Sec. 85.10 (21) (e), Stats., provides:

“Roadway is that portion of a,highway between the regularly established curb lines or that portion which is commonly used by vehicular traffic.”

*453 Prior to the time of the collision there had been a fall of snow. A snowplow had passed over the roadway and there were banks of snow on each side of the road some four or five feet in height.' The distance between the snowbanks was measured by the traffic officer, who testified:

“The road at the point of impact could have been either over or 'under twenty-two feet because the snowbanks were not even. . i . The twenty-two-foot measurement was from extreme edge to extreme edge. When I arrived at the scene, there was snow and ice on the roads on both ends of the traveled part. There was a churned-up portion in the center where vehicles had been traveling. The gravel showed up and the ordinary path was pretty well churned up. The line of travel kept pretty much to the center of the road. On the north side the snow extended out about seven feet toward the traveled portion. The traveled portion ran on the south side, as I recall. The snow and ice on the south side were a little narrower than on the north. The churned-up section was seven, possibly eight, feet wide . . . and was a little to the south side of the road. The center line of the highway, as shown in Exhibit 5, did not run directly along the center of this churned-up portion, necessarily. Exhibit 5 shows also the north part of the road on which there was no track.
“Exhibit 6 is a picture looking east, showing the rear of the truck with respect to the snowbank.”

It is apparent from a consideration of the testimony which is undisputed, and the position of the vehicles as disclosed by the photographs to which reference has been made, that there is some confusion due to the fact that at times reference is made to the portion of the roadway which had been traveled and which was seven or eight feet in width, and the travelable portion of the roadway which was eighteen feet in width. Referring now to the travelable portion of the highway it is clear from the testimony and photographs that the truck was at all times on the south or the truck driver’s right-hand side of the highway. It is also apparent that the Weinbrenner car followed that portion of the roadway which had been recently

*454

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Related

Martinson v. Brooks Equipment Leasing, Inc.
152 N.W.2d 849 (Wisconsin Supreme Court, 1967)
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134 N.W.2d 462 (Wisconsin Supreme Court, 1965)

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Bluebook (online)
33 N.W.2d 213, 252 Wis. 446, 1948 Wisc. LEXIS 332, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/uren-v-purity-dairy-co-wis-1948.