Cook v. United Rys. & Elec. Co. of Baltimore

• Decision Date: 04 April 1918
• Docket Number: 53.
• Citation: 104 A. 37,132 Md. 553
• Parties: COOK v. UNITED RYS. & ELECTRIC CO. OF BALTIMORE.
• Court: Maryland Court of Appeals

104 A. 37

132 Md. 553

COOK v. UNITED RYS. & ELECTRIC CO. OF BALTIMORE.

No. 53.

Court of Appeals of Maryland

April 4, 1918

Appeal from Baltimore City Court; Chas. W. Heuisler, Judge.

Action by Joseph E. Cook against the United Railways & Electric Company of Baltimore, a body corporate. From a judgment for defendant, plaintiff appeals. Affirmed.

Argued before BOYD, C.J., and BRISCOE, THOMAS, PATTISON STOCKBRIDGE, and CONSTABLE, JJ.

C. R Wattenscheidt and Laurie H. Riggs, both of Baltimore, for appellant.

J Pembroke Thom, of Baltimore (Walter V. Harrison and Joseph C France, both of Baltimore, on the brief), for appellee.

STOCKBRIDGE J.

The plaintiff, appellant in this court, brought suit to recover damages from the United Railways & Electric Company of Baltimore for injury to an auto ambulance, occasioned by a collision between the machine while being operated by one of his employés and a street car owned by the defendant and operated by its employés. The ambulance in question was of Cadillac make, weighing something over two tons.

On the morning of January 21, 1916, the plaintiff had been notified from the University Hospital that there was some one at Union Station to be brought to that hospital, and at the time of the collision the ambulance was on its way to answer that call. It was proceeding north on Cathedral street at a rate variously estimated from 15 to 25 miles per hour, and at the intersection of Cathedral and Biddle streets came in contact with a car of the defendant of the Roland Park line. The morning was wet and the streets slippery, but the ambulance was not at the time equipped with chains to prevent sliding or skidding. The driver in charge of the ambulance saw the car proceeding slowly westward when he was at a distance of from 100 to 125 feet south of Biddle street, but contended himself with ringing a large gong upon the ambulance, without seeking to check his speed until he was within 25 feet of the car. He then applied both the foot and the emergency brakes, and attempted to cut across the path of the car into Brevard street. The effect of this action was to bring him in a line parallel with the car, and he would probably have avoided the collision had not the machine skidded on the wet and slippery street. The condition of the street, the change in direction of the machine, and the sudden application of the brakes acted in combination to produce the result that the rear wheel of the ambulance struck the car about in the center. The ambulance was severely damaged, the repairs to it costing $692.68.

At the conclusion of the plaintiff's case the defendant offered three prayers; the first to the effect that there was no evidence in the case legally sufficient to entitle the plaintiff to recover, and that the verdict of the jury must be for the defendant. The third asked the court to instruct the jury that from the uncontradicted evidence in the case the driver of the ambulance was guilty of negligence directly contributing to the happening of the accident, and that the verdict of the jury must be for the defendant. These two prayers were granted by the court, whereupon the defendant withdrew its second prayer. The ruling of the trial court upon these prayers constitutes the sole exception in the record.

Several questions were raised by counsel at the argument, though it will be sufficient for the disposition of this case to consider only two of them.

The plaintiff urges as an act of negligence on the part of the defendant a failure to observe the ordinance then in force designed to regulate traffic in the streets of Baltimore city, and which gave a right of way at street intersections to north and south bound travel over that moving east and west. This provision, like all provisions of municipal regulation, must be given a reasonable construction. To extend it as far as the plaintiff now asks would be to place a prohibition upon all east and west bound traffic, a condition which cannot be supposed to have been intended by the framers of the ordinance, and it entirely ignored the further provision in the same ordinance that:

"Nothing contained herein or omitted herefrom shall be construed or held to relieve any person using or traveling, or being upon any street for any purpose whatever, from exercising all reasonable care to avoid or prevent injury, through collisions with all other persons and vehicles."

It is conceded that the speed of the ambulance was greater than that permitted by the ordinance, and that the car was...