Turbert v. Mather Motors, Inc.

• Decision Date: 14 November 1973
• Court: Connecticut Supreme Court
• Parties: Hollie TURBERT v. MATHER MOTORS, INC., et al.

Page 903

334 A.2d 903

165 Conn. 422

Hollie TURBERT v. MATHER MOTORS, INC., et al.

Supreme Court of Connecticut.

Nov. 14, 1973.

Louis M. Winer, New Haven, for appellant (defendant James F. daley).

Robert M. Owens, Branford, with whom, on the brief, was Richard S. Bruchal, Branford, for appellee (plaintiff).

Before HOUSE, C.J., and COTTER, SHAPIRO, LOISELLE and MacDONALD, JJ.

COTTER, Associate Justice.

The plaintiff, a passenger in an automobile owned and operated by the defendant James F. Daley in a northerly direction on Windsor Avenue, also known as route 5A, in the town of Windsor, claims she was injured when the Daley car was in a collision with another automobile operated by David Smith. The accident happened in the vicinity of a driveway or drive-in entrance to Mott's Supermarket. A verdict was rendered in favor of the plaintiff and the defendant Smith and against the defendant Daley, who has taken this appeal from the judgment.

We consider the claimed errors in the charge and the ruling of the court on the finding, with the correction to which the defendant Daley is entitled. The paragraphs in the finding that the defendant offered evidence to prove and claimed to have proved that the place where the collision occurred was an intersection within the meaning of the statutes are, as requested in his assignments of error, corrected to the extent that he did not offer evidence or claim that the area was such an intersection. Other corrections to the finding to which the defendant is entitled are not material to the decisive issues and would not change the result in any way. A finding in a jury case is a mere narrative of the facts claimed to have been proved, designed to test the correctness of the charge and the rulings of the court. State v. Carnegie, 158 Conn. 264, 266, 259 A.2d 628, cert. denied, 396 U.S. 992, 90 S.Ct. 488, 24 L.Ed.2d 455.

Viewing the evidence presented in the light most favorable to the plaintiff, the jury could have found the following Windsor Avenue, or route 5A, runs generally north and south, with two lanes southbound and two lanes northbound; the northbound and southbound portions of the avenue, which were each approximately twenty-four feet wide, were separated by a median or divider approximately six feet in width for that portion of Windsor Avenue from a point approximately 100 yards south to a point 100 yards north of the drive-in entrance to Mott's Supermarket. There was an opening in the divider approximately 100 feet long. In the vicinity of the drive-in entrance to the supermarket traffic lights were suspended over Windsor Avenue, showing red, green and amber signals to traffic southbound and northbound on Windsor Avenue, which were arranged to display a green light to southbound traffic approximately five seconds before a green light was shown to northbound traffic so that southbound cars could make a left-hand turn into the supermarket parking lot. There were also two so-called trips located in the supermarket driveways to activate the overhead traffic lights as indicated in a full exhibit introduced into evidence.

The defendant Smith had been driving his car south on Windsor Avenue at about 10 p.m. on the evening of the collision; directly after the accident the Smith car was located on the east side of the northbound lanes heading in a northeasterly direction, north of the Daley car which also came to rest in the northbound lanes partly in the driveway leading into the supermarket, facing in a northeasterly direction.

The defendant Smith had stopped at the traffic light with his left blinker on, intending to make a left-hand turn into the driveway. A car was stopped in the lefthand northbound lane, and when the light turned green for him, Smith waited for that car to move northerly, which it failed to do. Smith proceeded to make a lefthand turn and as he did so he was struck by the Daley car which was in the righthand northbound lane.

The posted speed limit in the vicinity of the collision was thirty-five miles per hour in both directions; the portion of Windsor Avenue from 200 yards to the south of the opening in the esplanade in front of the twenty-four foot wide supermarket driveway to a point approximately 200 yards to the north of that opening was generally level and substantially straight.

When the vehicles stopped immediately after the collision, the right rear portion of the Daley car was approximately six and one-half feet from the east curb line of Windsor Avenue, on the traveled portion of the northbound lanes adjacent to the supermarket driveway entrance, and the rear portion of the Smith car also came to rest on the traveled portion of Windsor Avenue.

The defendant Daley claims that the trial court erred in instructing the jury under General Statutes § 14-299(b) which he argues is inapplicable to the facts of this case so that the instructions imposed inconsistent duties upon the drivers and confused the jury; and that the trial court erred in limiting the cross-examination of a police officer and excluding an exhibit offered by the defendant.

The determinative issue in this case is whether, as the defendant Daley contends, the trial court erred when it charged the jury pursuant to General Statutes § 14-299(b), which regulates the right-of-way at intersections when traffic is directed by traffic control signals exhibiting colored lights. The crux of the defendant's argument is that the rules prescribed by § 14-299(b) apply, by its specific terms, ¹ only to intersections as defined by General Statutes § 14-1(18) which states that an intersection 'means the area embraced within the prolongation of the lateral curb lines of two or more highways which join one another at an angle, whether or not one such highway crosses the other.' The defendant Daley claims that the area in question does not fall within the statutory definition because, as he argues, there is only one highway as defined by General Statutes § 14-1(16), ² despite the existence of traffic control signals suspended over the highway and at the supermarket entrance, a one-hundred-foot break in the esplanade, a five-second lead green light to allow southbound cars to turn left into the parking area, a pedestrian crosswalk enclosed by painted lines, and 'trip' mechanisms at the entrance to control the light.

Section 14-299(b) of the General Statutes is the only section which governs motor vehicle operational conduct at areas controlled by signals exhibiting colored lights and which, at the time of the collision, mandated rules applicable to drivers facing green lights at intersections. There was no statute which specifically governed the conduct of drivers at traffic control signals exhibiting colored lights at areas other than 'intersections.' The trial court did not instruct the jury that the site of the accident was an intersection as the word is commonly used or an 'intersection' within the meaning of the term as defined by § 14-1(18). Rather, the court charged that there was a statute which applied when a light change from green to red and which defined the meaning of the green light. The court then quoted portions of the statute, including that language which required that traffic facing a green signal must yield to traffic lawfully within the intersection. The issue presented, therefore, assuming arguendo that the area controlled by the traffic light was not an intersection within the definition of § 14-1(18), is whether the trial court's statement defining the legal duties of drivers confronting a green light at an intersection was correct as applied to operators facing the green light controlling traffic on the four-lane highway, the cross-over area and the supermarket drive-in.

Other jurisdictions have resolved the enigma wherein the legislature did not in statutory language specifically provide rules for particular factual situations involving traffic lights e.g., the Supreme Court of Nebraska has held, where there was no statute relating to left turns at a traffic light, that '(i)n the absence of a statute or ordinance, the meaning to be given to a traffic control signal is that which a reasonably prudent motorist would understand and apply.' Heavican v. Holbrook, 187 Neb. 814, 818, 194 N.W.2d 208, 211; Galloway v. Hartman, 271 N.C. 372, 377, 156 S.E.2d 727; 60A C.J.S. Motor Vehicles § 360(1), p. 536. Furthermore, some jurisdictions have held that statutes governing intersections applied to areas which appeared to be intersections but were not technically intersections because private roads were abutting public roads. Grulich v. Paine, 231 N.Y. 311, 132 N.E. 100; Perry v. Carter, 14 La.App. 102, 129 So. 388. The rationale of these cases was stated succinctly by the New York Court of Appeals in the Grulich case, supra, 231 N.Y. 316, 132 N.E. 102, wherein a railroad depot driveway abutted a public road: 'The statutes are intended to promote safety, order and convenience. The same reasons why drivers of motor vehicles should observe the rules that are generally accepted and enforced in crossing streets where another street intersects or abuts, exist at the entrance of the driveway in question as if it had been dedicated to and accepted by the public.'

References in a charge to the jury concerning the rights and duties of motorists in intersections have been held not erroneous in a case involving a collision which occurred when an automobile was making a left turn into a shopping center parking lot on a divided four-lane highway. The court reasoned that regardless of whether the area in question was an intersection, the trial court's charge was not prejudicial because it correctly stated the applicable law. Gilmore v. Marsh, 424 Pa. 361, 227 A.2d 881.

A driver when faced with a green light at an intersection must act as a reasonably prudent person with a knowledge that he cannot proceed in disregard of other vehicles in the intersection. General Statutes §...