New York Cent. & H.R.R. Co. v. Maidment

• Decision Date: 12 March 1909
• Docket Number: 35.
• Parties: NEW YORK CENT. & H.R.R. CO. et al. v. MAIDMENT.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Third Circuit

168 F. 21

NEW YORK CENT. & H.R.R. CO. et al. v. MAIDMENT.

No. 35.

United States Court of Appeals, Third Circuit.

March 12, 1909

James B. Vredenburgh and Albert C. Wall, for plaintiffs in error.

John S Mackay, for defendant in error.

Before DALLAS, GRAY, and BUFFINGTON, Circuit Judges.

BUFFINGTON Circuit Judge.

In the court below, Maidment, hereafter styled plaintiff, sued the railroads, hereafter styled defendants, for damages sustained by him in a collision between an automobile, driven by him and defendants' passenger train. The plaintiff recovered a verdict, and to review the judgment entered thereon defendants sued out this writ. A number of errors are alleged, but in our view the case turns on the refusal to give binding instructions for the defendants. If the plaintiff was guilty of contributory negligence, the point was well taken. To that question we therefore address ourselves.

At 7:21 on the evening of August 17, 1906, plaintiff drove his steam automobile westwardly on the Ft. Lee road to a point where the highway crossed at right angles the double-track main line of the defendants. A friend, Herrick by name, occupied the seat beside him. He states in his declaration it--

'was an extraordinarily dangerous crossing, for the public using the highway known as the Ft. Lee road, in that the approach of locomotives and cars of the defendants is obscured by a bridge, woods, trees, foliage, buildings, poles, and other obstructions, and the tracks of the defendants, at the time aforesaid, were constructed in a curved line, preventing a clear view of the defendants' locomotives and cars moving in either direction towards the crossing aforesaid which bridges, woods, trees, foliage, buildings, poles, and curved track obscured the view of persons crossing or attempting to cross the tracks of the defendants at the place aforesaid, in the borough aforesaid, on the 17th day of August, 1906.'

He was familiar with the place, from crossing it that morning and several times before. A watchman was located there, but had left before plaintiff approached.

At a point 15 or 20 feet back from the east-bound track, plaintiff stopped his machine to await the passage of a long freight train on the nearest, or east-bound, track. He waited until the freight was 180 feet beyond the crossing, when he started his automobile down the sharp decline to the east-bound track and attempted to dart across the double tracks. At that instant a passenger train coming westward on the other, or west-bound, track, struck and wrecked his automobile and seriously injured the plaintiff. Was he guilty of contributory negligence in making the crossing?

With the coming into use of the automobile, new questions as to reciprocal rights and duties of the public and that vehicle have and will continue to arise. At no place are those relations more important than at the grade crossings of railroads. The main consideration hitherto with reference to such crossings has been the danger to those crossing. A ponderous, swiftly moving locomotive, followed by a heavy train, is subjected to slight danger by a crossing foot passenger, or a span of horses and a vehicle; but, when the passing vehicle is a ponderous steel structure, it threatens not only the safety of its own occupants, but also those on the colliding train. And when to the perfect control of such a machine is added the factor of high speed, the temptation to dash over a track at terrific speed makes the automobile, unless carefully controlled, a new and grave element of crossing danger. On the other hand, when properly controlled, this powerful machine possesses capabilities contributing to safety. When a driver of horses attempts to make a crossing and is suddenly confronted by a train, difficulties face him to which the automobile is not subject. He cannot drive close to the track, or stop there, without risk of his horse frightening, shying, or overturning his vehicle. He cannot well leave his horse standing, and if he goes forward to the track to get an...