Krska v. Incorporated Town of Pocahontas
| Decision Date | 07 April 1925 |
| Docket Number | 36259 |
| Citation | 203 N.W. 39,200 Iowa 594 |
| Parties | EFFIE KRSKA, Appellant, v. INCORPORATED TOWN OF POCAHONTAS, Appellee |
| Court | Iowa Supreme Court |
REHEARING DENIED OCTOBER 2, 1925.
Appeal from Pocahontas District Court.--JAMES DELAND, Judge.
ACTION for personal injury received by the giving way of a defective cover of a coalhole in a sidewalk. At the conclusion of all the evidence, the court directed a verdict for the defendant and plaintiff appeal.--Reversed and remanded.
Reversed and remanded.
Gilchrist & Gilchrist and Mitchell, Files & Mutholland, for appellant.
Ralston & Shaw and Kelleher & Mitchell, for appellee.
T. F Lynch, for William Shimon.
The appellant was injured by the giving way of an iron trapdoor that covered an opening in a concrete sidewalk on one of the business streets of the appellee town. The opening was into an areaway beneath the sidewalk that was used as a coal bin, and was connected with the adjoining business house. When appellant, in passing along the sidewalk, stepped upon the door, it gave way, allowing her limbs and the lower part of her body to fall into the opening, resulting in her injury. The material negligence charged was in permitting the doors to become defective, dangerous, and out of repair; in failing to repair the cover and keep it in reasonably safe condition; in permitting the cover to become rusted and defective; and in failing to take such precautions as were reasonably necessary to make the sidewalk safe for public travel.
While there is some controversy as to the duty devolving on the officers of a municipality in respect to the safety of its sidewalks, the principal question is one of fact.
Without setting out the evidence in detail, we may say that there was testimony from which the jury might have found the following facts: The opening in the sidewalk was some 30 inches square. The cover consisted of an iron frame, resting on a projection in the concrete, to which two iron doors were fastened by hinges at their sides. The doors were each about 15 inches wide and 30 inches long, and when closed, covered the opening. When closed, the doors were supported by their hinges on one side, and by an angle or channel iron riveted to the sides of the frame, upon which the ends of the doors rested. At one time there had been an iron bar across the opening, that supported the doors in the center; but this had been removed. The hinges were upon the upper surface of the doors and frame, and were rusted. After the accident, the bolt in one hinge was found to be broken, and the other was broken where the bolt went through. It was a rusty break, and appeared to be partly old and partly new. The angle or channel iron that supported the ends of the doors was rusted. and the rivets were rusted off. It would appear that, when appellant stepped on the door, one of these angle irons gave way, allowing the door to go down; and that this broke the hinges. For some two months before the accident, the doors had been "springy" when stepped on. The coalhole and cover were put in in 1917.
The pivotal question is whether the evidence was sufficient to take to the jury the question of appellee's constructive notice of the defective and unsafe condition of the trapdoors.
The rules of law applicable to the duty of a town or city with respect to the safety of its sidewalks are well settled. It is required to exercise reasonable diligence to maintain them in a reasonably safe condition; and this duty extends, not merely to the surface of the walk, but to those things within its control which endanger the safety of those properly using the walk. Beazan v. Incorporated Town of Mason City 58 Iowa 233, 12 N.W. 279; Bliven v. City of Sioux City, 85 Iowa 346, 52 N.W. 246; Wheeler v. City of Fort Dodge, 131 Iowa 566, 108 N.W. 1057; Kiple v. Incorporated Town of Clermont, 188 Iowa 248, 174 N.W. 251; Spiker v. City of...
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