Willworth v. Boston Elevated R. Co.
| Decision Date | 19 May 1905 |
| Citation | 188 Mass. 220,74 N.E. 333 |
| Parties | WILLWORTH v. BOSTON ELEVATED RY. CO. |
| Court | United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court |
Curtis G. Metzler and Donald B. Ward, for plaintiff.
Russell A. Sears and Hugh Bancroft, for defendant.
The plaintiff was a passenger on the defendant's elevated railway, and in passing from the car to the platform at a station she got her foot through the space between the car and the platform, and was injured. The car was constructed according to the description in Hannon v. Boston Elevated Railway Co., 182 Mass. 425, 65 N.E. 809, with a wide sliding door on the side, half way between its ends, through which the passengers passed out of the car, and with doors at the end through which others entered. The platform was on a level with the floor of the car. The plaintiff testified that the space between the car and the platform was from three to four inches in width. The defendant offered evidence, which was uncontradicted, that the space between the car and the platform was three inches wide when the car stood absolutely vertical, and that in the ordinary operation of the train there might be an oscillation from side to side of two inches, causing the space between the car and platform to vary from one to five inches in width, according to the manner of the tilting of the car. The defendant offered evidence that this oscillation was a necessary incident to the operation of the train, and that it would not be safe to have the platform of the station any nearer than this was to the side of the train. There was testimony that the car was very much crowded, and that the guard on the platform told the passengers, 'as he usually does,' to 'step lively,' or 'move quickly.' The plaintiff testified that she was passing out in a crowd so great that she could not turn around, and that 'she went out practically sidewise, instead of going straight forward,' and that in this way her foot and leg went down between the car and the platform, nearly to the knee. This was substantially all the evidence. There is nothing to show negligence of the defendant in the construction of the car or the platform. The jury would not have been warranted in finding on this evidence that a safer or better way of passing from the car to the platform could have been provided. There was no suggestion either in evidence or in the argument of any safer practicable method of passing that would enable the defendant to give the...
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