Baldwin v. State of California

• Court: United States State Supreme Court (California)
• Citation: 6 Cal.3d 424,99 Cal.Rptr. 145,491 P.2d 1121
• Decision Date: 03 January 1972
• Docket Number: S.F. 22813
• Parties: , 491 P.2d 1121 Jesse BALDWIN, Plaintiff and Appellant, v. The STATE of California et al., Defendants and Respondents. In Bank

Page 145

99 Cal.Rptr. 145

6 Cal.3d 424, 491 P.2d 1121

Jesse BALDWIN, Plaintiff and Appellant, v. The STATE of California et al., Defendants and Respondents.

S.F. 22813.

Supreme Court of California,

In Bank.

Jan. 3, 1972.

Rehearing Denied Feb. 2, 1972.

Caldecott, Peck & Phillips, and Edward F. Peck, Oakland, for plaintiff and appellant.

Robert E. Cartwright, San Francisco, Edward I. Pollock, Theodore A. Horn, Los Angeles, Marvin E. Lewis, San Francisco, William H. Lally, Sacramento, Joseph W. Cotchett, San Mateo, and Leonard Sacks, Pico Rivera, amici curiae on behalf of plaintiff and appellant.

Harry S. Fenton, Sacramento, John P. Horgan, Robert J. DeFea, William R. Edgar, Robert R. Buell and William J. Turner, San Francisco, for defendants and respondents.

Evelle J. Younger, Atty. Gen., and Robert L. Bergman, Deputy Atty. Gen., amici curiae on behalf of defendants and respondents.

SULLIVAN, Associate Justice.

This case presents the question whether a public entity retains its statutory immunity from liability for injury caused by the plan or design of a construction of, or an improvement to, public property where the plan or design, although approved in advance as being safe, nevertheless in its actual operation becomes dangerous under changed physical conditions. In Cabell v. State of California (1967) 67 Cal.2d 150, 60 Cal.Rptr. 476, 430 P.2d 34 and Becker v. Johnston (1967) 67 Cal.2d 163, 60 Cal.Rptr. 485, 430 P.2d 43, we previously considered this problem and held that the design immunity remained intact even though changed circumstances had clearly revealed the defects of the plan. Upon reconsideration of this question, we are convinced that the Legislature did not intend that public entities should be permitted to shut their eyes to the operation of a plan or design once it has been transferred from blueprint to blacktop. We have, therefore, concluded that the above holding in Cabell and Becker should be overturned.

On August 28, 1967, at 4:25 p.m., plaintiff Jesse Baldwin was driving his Ford pickup truck in a northerly direction on Hoffman Boulevard, a four-lane state highway in the City of Richmond with a posted speed limit of 55 miles per hour. He intended to make a left turn onto Central Avenue, which crosses Hoffman Boulevard at right angles. Since Hoffman Boulevard had no special left-turn lane at this intersection, Baldwin stopped his truck in the inside or 'fast' northbound lane to await a break in the oncoming traffic. While there stopped, his truck was struck from the rear by another northbound vehicle and knocked into southbound traffic, where it was hit head on. As a result of the collision plaintiff sustained severe personal injuries.

Plaintiff brought the present action for damages against the state and the rear-ending driver. His complaint set forth two counts against the state: the first, alleging that the rear-end collision was proximately caused by a dangerous condition of public property of which the state had actual notice a sufficient time prior to the accident to have taken measures to protect against the dangerous condition; the second count, incorporating almost all of the allegations of the first count and in addition alleging a failure of the state to warn plaintiff of such dangerous condition by installing signs, devices and markings on the roadway. On this appeal only the claim against the state is before us.

Essentially plaintiff's action against the state is grounded on section 835, subdivision (b), of the Government Code, ¹ which provides that a public entity is liable for injury proximately caused by a dangerous condition of its property if the dangerous condition created a reasonably foreseeable risk of the kind of injury sustained and the public entity had actual or constructive notice of the condition a sufficient time before the injury to have taken preventive measures. ² Plaintiff contends that the intersection at Hoffman and Central constituted a dangerous condition for northbound motorists desiring to turn left onto Central because of the absence of a left-turn lane, the heavy traffic, and the high speeds on Hoffman Boulevard. ³

Through documents attached as exhibits to answers to interrogatories posed by the state, ⁴ plaintiff established the following facts, which would amply support a finding that the intersection represented a dangerous condition, of which the state had actual and timely notice. In July 1961 the Richmond police submitted a report to the state Division of Highways which noted that of the 13 accidents at the Hoffman-Central intersection between January 1 and June 30, 1961, 7 were rear-end collisions caused by attempts to make left turns. Three months later, in October 1961, the Richmond traffic engineer advised the Division of Highways that this intersection accounted for 14 percent of all traffic fatalities in the city and that the injury-fatality rate for collisions there was double the rate for the rest of Richmond. The engineer's report revealed that in the preceding 3.7 years, 42 accidents occurred at the crossing, causing four deaths. The report estimated that 67 percent of the collisions might have been avoided by proper traffic signals.

In 1962 and 1963 three businesses located in a nearby industrial park wrote to the Division of Highways, describing serious accidents at the intersection and requesting corrective action. One of the firms stated that in the nine weeks during which its offices had been located in the area, eight collisions had taken place at the intersection. Another declared that two of its employees had been involved in severe accidents there within the preceding four months. Soon thereafter, the Division of Highway notified the City of Richmond that it was restudying traffic conditions at the intersection and was considering constructing a physical barrier on Hoffman Boulevard to prevent turns onto Central Avenue. The city traffic engineer responded enthusiastically, but no barrier was erected.

In 1963 the Richmond City Council unanimously passed and sent to the Division of Highways a resolution urging the construction of an overpass at Hoffman and Central because of the 'very high and critical rate of injury and fatality accidents.' This request was repeated early in 1964 in a letter to the division by the local state assemblyman.

The record further tends to show that the hazardous nature of the intersection resulted from changed conditions--e.g., the large increase in traffic on Hoffman Boulevard since its construction in 1942. When the boulevard was designed, according to a declaration of an engineer for the Division of Highways, 'there was very little development of the lands lying to the west of Hoffman Boulevard which were served by the roadway now known as Central Avenue and vehicular travel on said roadway to the west of Hoffman Boulevard was very light.'

By February 1956 a traffic survey made by the City of Richmond showed that 1,440 vehicles per hour passed northbound through the intersection at rush hours. Because of the high incidence of accidents, left turns for Southbound vehicles were prohibited in 1956. In September of that year the San Rafael-Richmond Bridge opened, further increasing traffic on Hoffman Boulevard, which is a main connecting highway to the bridge. By mid-1961, a state traffic survey indicated that 17,218 vehicles entered the intersection in an eight-hour period, an average of 2,152 per hour. An industrial park was developed at the west end of Central Avenue in 1961--1962, producing an even heavier traffic load and increasing the number of vehicles turning left off Hoffman Boulevard. By October 1963 a traffic count taken by the Division of Highways revealed that approximately 3,000 vehicles per hour passed through the intersection at peak traffic periods.

Despite this showing, the state moved for summary judgment on the ground that plaintiff's action was barred by section 830.6. That section provides that a public entity is immune from liability for injuries caused by the plan or design of a public improvement where such plan or design has been approved in advance by the legislative body of the public entity or by some other body or employee exercising discretionary authority and where the court finds any substantial evidence on the basis of which a reasonable entity or employee could have approved the plan. ⁵

Accompanying the motion for summary judgment were the declarations of two engineers who had worked for the California Division of Highways on the planning and construction of Hoffman Boulevard in the vicinity of the Central Avenue intersection. The declarations stated in substance as follows. The intersection was built in 1942 in accordance with two sets of plans. The first, which provided for construction of a graded roadbed, was approved March 11, 1942 by John H. Skeggs, then district engineer of district 04 of the Division of Highways, and on March 12, 1942 by C. H. Purcell, then state highway engineer of the division. The second plan, dealing with the paving of the roadbed, was approved by Skeggs on May 12, 1942 and by Purcell on May 14, 1942. Purcell, as state highway engineer, had discretionary authority to approve such plans on behalf of the state. The blueprints made no provision for a turning lane or for any traffic control devices at the intersection but freely permitted left turns from Hoffman Boulevard onto Central Avenue. Traffic conditions existing at the time of the preparation of the plans and anticipated in the future were not considered such as to warrant regulation or prohibition of left turns, or the installation of a turning lane. The blue-prints for Hoffman Boulevard met then approved standards of the Division of Highways and then accepted highway engineering practices. The intersection was constructed in accordance with the above-described plans and conformed thereto in August 1967.

Plaintiff filed no declarations in...