Thompson v. City of Houma, La.

• Decision Date: 25 March 1935
• Docket Number: No. 7526.,7526.
• Citation: 76 F.2d 793
• Parties: THOMPSON et al. v. CITY OF HOUMA, LA.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit

76 F.2d 793 (1935)

THOMPSON et al. v. CITY OF HOUMA, LA.

No. 7526.

Circuit Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit.

March 25, 1935.

C. Elliot Thompson and J. C. Theus, both of Monroe, La., and Harry McCall and Jacob H. Morrison, both of New Orleans, La., for appellants.

Henry P. Dart, Jr., and H. Grady Price, both of New Orleans, La., for appellee.

Before BRYAN, HUTCHESON, and WALKER, Circuit Judges.

BRYAN, Circuit Judge.

This is an appeal by the plaintiffs in an action to recover damages from the city of Houma, a Louisiana municipal corporation, for personal injuries sustained when an automobile in which they were passing through the city was driven by mistake off the end of Lafayette street into Bayou Terrebonne. The city was charged with negligence in failing to maintain adequate barriers or signs at the approach to the bayou for the protection of the traveling public.

Lafayette street extends from the city limits on the south to the bayou on the north. It is intersected 90 feet south of the bayou by Main street, which runs east and west parallel with the bayou. South and east of the intersection both streets are well lighted and paved with concrete; but that part of Lafayette street north of the intersection has no street lights and is not paved or otherwise improved, except for a triangular area of shell and gravel which comes to a point about halfway to the bayou, thus leaving 45 or 50 feet of uneven ground covered with grass next to the bayou. Extending across the end of this street, except for a recess of 10 feet in the center, is a bulkhead which rises above the ground some 16 inches. There is no appreciable change in elevation between the intersection and the bulkhead. There is no street leading from the opposite bank of the bayou in line with Lafayette street. The Old Spanish Trail, United States highway No. 90, follows Lafayette and Main streets through the city turning at the intersection above described. At the northeast corner of that intersection was a large sign with an arrow pointing east and the words "To New Orleans" printed on it in large letters; and 117 feet to the south on the east side of Lafayette street was a highway marker indicating a right turn onto Main street. Both the sign and the marker could easily be seen by the light of a 250 c. p. street lamp located at the southwest corner. As one comes north up Lafayette street, on the right about eight feet above ground are at least nine highway markers which are made visible at night by street lights.

The accident occurred at night. The occupants of the car, a two-door Ford sedan, were Herbert C. Thompson, his wife, two grown daughters, Elizabeth and Ruth, three children under seven years of age, and a young man named Bourg. They were traveling over the Old Spanish Trail from Beaumont, Tex., where they lived, on their way to New Orleans, and reached Houma about 4 o'clock a. m. They were all wholly unfamiliar with the streets of Houma and with the course of the highway in that vicinity. At the city limits they turned north on Lafayette street. The speed limit prescribed by ordinance was 15 miles an hour, and that information appeared on an illuminated street sign. Mr. Thompson, who was driving, testified that he did not see the speed limit sign or any of the highway markers; that he drove across Main street without slowing down at about 20 miles an hour, and that, although as he did so he heard some one shout "hey, hey," he proceeded beyond the intersection about 40 or 50 feet when he saw what he "was into," and then applied the service and emergency brakes, but not being able to stop the car, he turned it to the right into the bulkhead, bursting the left-front tire, and breaking loose the front axle, with the final result that the car and its occupants were precipitated into the bayou. He estimated that he first saw the water when he was about 10 feet away from the bayou, which at that point is 85 feet in width. He sought to justify his mistake of continuing on Lafayette street north of Main by saying he was misled by the circumstances that there were an overhead unlighted traffic signal in the center of the intersection, a traffic line along the middle of Lafayette street which extended to the end of the pavement, and a street light some 400 or 500 feet directly ahead. That light, however, was on another street running parallel...