Horton v. Georgia Power Co.

• Decision Date: 13 March 1979
• Docket Number: No. 57391,57391
• Citation: 254 S.E.2d 479,149 Ga.App. 328
• Parties: HORTON v. GEORGIA POWER COMPANY.
• Court: Georgia Court of Appeals

Page 479

254 S.E.2d 479

149 Ga.App. 328

HORTON v. GEORGIA POWER COMPANY.

No. 57391.

Court of Appeals of Georgia.

Argued March 5, 1979.

Decided March 13, 1979.

Powell, Goldstein, Frazer & Murphy, Robert M. Travis, Atlanta, for appellant.

Troutman, Sanders, Lockerman & Ashmore, Frederick E. Link, Robert L. Pennington, Atlanta, for appellee.

WEBB, Presiding Judge.

Jimmy L. Horton negligently drove his Ford van into a utility pole owned by Georgia Power Company in East Point, as a result of which the pole was broken, necessitating replacement. It was a 55 foot class 3 pole, which carried a 3-phase 20 KV primary, two span guy's, two sign stringers and a street light. The power company sued Horton for damages.

Replacement cost was stipulated to be $542.09. It was also stipulated that the actual cost out-of-stock of the pole itself was $200.69 when it was installed in 1974, that the pole had been in place for approximately two years at the time of the accident, and that while Georgia Power assigns no fixed life expectancy for each pole, the entire distribution system is depreciated for tax and accounting purposes at 3.3% Per year. There was no evidence that the pole had any market value or that its value was in fact different from the cost of repairs.

The trial court granted Georgia Power's motion for summary judgment and entered judgment for $542.09. Horton appeals, and we affirm.

The sole question in dispute, both in the trial court and here on appeal, was whether the power company was entitled to recover all its necessary expenses for replacement of the utility pole without deduction for depreciation based upon the age of the pole.

"Damages are given as compensation for the injury done and generally this is the measure where the injury is of a character capable of being estimated in money." Code Ann. § 105-2001. A utility pole is a very small, but nonetheless integral, part of any electrical distribution system. Its value lies in its service, that is, in its remaining in place and continuing to perform its function with many other similar poles and equipment in sustaining an electrical distribution system. It is chiefly or rather exclusively valuable to the power company. It is hardly practical to attempt to apply a measure of damages based on the difference in market value before and after the accident. Cost of repairs is about the only available measure of loss. "Where the property is not marketable its value must be ascertained by such proof as the nature of the case admits of. One criterion of damage may be its actual value to the owner, and this is the rule where it is chiefly or exclusively valuable to him." Cherry v. McCutchen, 65 Ga.App. 301, 303(2), 16 S.E.2d 167, 168 (1941).

Zeeman Mfg. Co. v. L. R. Sams Co., 123 Ga.App. 99, 179 S.E.2d 552 (1970), Housing Authority v. Savannah Iron & Wire Works, 91 Ga.App. 881, 87 S.E.2d 671 (1955) and Housing Authority v. Goolsby, 136 Ga.App. 156, 220 S.E.2d 466 (1975), relied upon by Horton, are inapposite. The two housing authority cases involve the measure of damages in condemnation cases, and neither involves the question of damages to an integral part of a larger or more comprehensive property, or a property such as an electrical distribution system. Zeeman was a suit by a lessor against the lessee for damages to a building. The lease involved apparently included a provision that the property was to be returned in the same condition excluding "normal wear and tear."

More analogous to the present factual situation would be instances when fences have been destroyed. The Supreme Court held in Central R. etc. Co. v. Murray, 93 Ga. 256, 257(4), 20 S.E. 129 (1893), "For fencing injured or destroyed the recovery should be measured by the cost of restoring it and making its condition as good as that in which it was when injured or destroyed."

" 'The value of the property destroyed, or the cost of restoring or replacing such property, is the proper measure of damages for the destruction of buildings, fences, and other improvements, which may at once be replaced, where the exact cost of restoring the property destroyed is capable of definite ascertainment, and where there is no damage to the realty itself.' (Cits.)" Empire Mills Co. v. Burrell Engineering etc. Co., 18...