Longenecker v. Zanghi

Parke, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. The judgment below was for the damages sustained by the plaintiff as a result of the collision within the lines of the intersection of two highways of his truck with the automobile of the defendant. The plaintiff, Philip S. Zanghi, owns and operates motor-trucks under the name of the Red Line Transfer Company. He was driving his loaded new truck northward on the Jarrettsville Road in the early sunny afternoon of August 5th, 1937, and, as he entered the intersection of the Paper Mill Road with the highway on which he was traveling, a collision happened between his motor truck and an automobile driven eastward on the Paper Mill Road by Edna D. Longenecker, the owner, who was accompanied by a friend, Freda Snyder.

The Jarrettsville ³¹⁰ Road is of concrete construction and is between fifteen and sixteen feet in width. The Paper Mill Road is slightly less wide and has a macadam surface. Both roads are public highways and would intersect at right angles except that the Jarrettsville Road bears slightly to the west at the crossing. In the northwest corner of the intersection there is a gas station and store, and on the southwest corner there is a gas station and building, which, as both drivers neared the crossing, partly obstructed the view of the driver of the truck on the Paper Mill Road for a short distance west of the crossing, and the view of the driver of the automobile on the Jarrettsville Road for a short distance south of the crossing.

The intersection of the highways was in the open country and there were no traffic lights or other methods of control. When the accident occurred there was no trayel to interfere with the operation of the motor vehicles of the plaintiff and defendant. The plaintiff’s testimony tended to prove that he was approaching the crossing on the east or right side of the Jarrettsville Road at the reduced speed of from twenty-five to thirty miles an hour, and, when about fifteen feet away from the southern limit of the Paper Mill Road, he looked for traffic, and then first saw the defendant’s automobile, which was about thirty to forty feet west of the crossing and moving towards it. The automobile was in the north line of travel and, so, on the wrong side of the highway, 'and was going at the rate of between thirty-five and forty miles an hour, which was by statute presumptively unreasonable, but not necessarily an unlawful speed.

Code (1935 Supp.) art. 56, sec. 194, subsecs. (3), (4). Under normal conditions the plaintiff had the right of way at the crossing, but as soon as he realized that the defendant was not slowing down her automobile to stop, he applied his brakes as quickly as he could. At that time the truck was about three feet away from the crossing and, with its load and its speed, could have been stopped in ten feet on the slight upgrade.

The right front side of the automobile struck the front part of the truck. The collision was within the intersection in its northeast ³¹¹ quarter and on the north side of the Paper Mill Road. There was further testimony on the part of the plaintiff to the effect that the plaintiff had not applied his brakes as soon as he had observed the defendant’s automobile and the speed at which it was moving, because he had believed that the driver could and would stop to give him his right of way. After the accident, there is testimony that the defendant stated that she had not seen the truck.

If true, this would prove that she had not looked when she would have seen the truck. On the part of the defendant there was testimony from which the jury might have found that the view of the defendant to the south on the Jarrettsville Road was obstructed as her automobile approached until she arrived at a point eight or nine feet from the western line of the intersection. At that time she had, according to her testimony, reduced the speed of the automobile to twenty miles an hour and was to the right of the center of the Paper Mill Road. She saw the truck, and it was coming at a high rate of speed, which was estimated to be from thirty-five to forty-five miles an hour.

The defendant immediately applied the brakes, but did not bring her automobile to a stop until it was out in the intersection, where it was hit by the front part of the truck. The defendant testified that she is not certain whether her automobile stopped west of the center line of the Jarrettsville Road, or stopped over the center line before the impact took place, nor whether the truck was on its own side of the road. There was testimony, however, of other witnesses, from which the jury might have found that the automobile was west of the center line and was there struck by the truck, which was not quite eight feet in width. In this connection there was testimony on the part of the plaintiff that the narrowness and bend of the highway and the width of the truck had a tendency to make the truck, although driven with reasonable care and skill, ride over the center line of the roadway.

Code (Supp. 1935) art. 56, sec. 209, pp. 761, 762. The general rule that the motor vehicle should keep to the right of the center line does not apply ³¹² where the width of the road is too narrow for the rule to be observed. It was on this conflicting testimony that the case went to the jury. The only exception taken is to the ruling of the court on the special exception to the fourth prayer and on the granted and rejected prayers.

It is quite apparent that the resolution of the conflicting testimony was for the jury, and that the court rightly refused to take the case from the jury on the theory that the uncontradicted testimony established that the plaintiff was guilty of negligence which directly contributed to the happening of the accident. If the jury should accept the plaintiff’s version, it could find that plaintiff was in the enjoyment of his right of way and in the exercise of reasonable care. He was not bound to anticipate that a traveler approaching the intersection of the highway on the plaintiff’s left would not be on the outlook for travel coming on the traveler’s right while the latter kept the automobile in which he was traveling under such control and at such a rate of speed that, when he should see the near approach to the intersection of a motor vehicle on the right, the automobile could be stopped before entering the intersection. Code (1935 Supp.) art. 56, sec. 209.

Taxicab Company v. Ottenritter, 151 Md. 525, 530 , 135 A. 587 ; Buckey v. White, 137 Md. 124 , 111 A. 777 ; Huddy, Encyc. of Automobile Law (9th Ed.) vol. 3-4, sec. 137. What the plaintiff says he anticipated would be done the defendant asserts she attempted to do. She testified: “It was my intention when I slowed down at a point eight or ten feet from the edge of the road and saw this truck coming from my right, to stop and permit him to go by. I immediately applied my brakes when I saw the truck coming. Í had slowed down to twenty miles an hour before I was eight or nine feet from the Jarrettsville Road.” So, if the jury should find these facts, it cannot be maintained, under these circumstances, that the plaintiff entered the intersection in the face of an imminent danger which was apparent to him in the exercise of reasonable ³¹³ care, as was true in the case of the Sun Cab Co. v. Reustle, 172 Md. 494, 500 , 192 A. 292 .

Here the defendant affirms that she reduced the speed of the automobile as she neared the intersection. Because of the temporary obstruction of her vision to the right as she approached the intersection, her duty to exercise care and caution increased to a degree commensurate with the greater danger. At what point she slowed down before she reached the distance of eight or ten feet is uncertain. The plaintiff testified that he had not observed any slowing down, when the automobile was, as he estimated, about thirty to forty feet west of the intersection.

As soon as he realized that she was not attempting to stop, the plaintiff applied the brakes to the truck as quickly as he could. The front of the truck was at that time but three feet south of the intersection, and the truck was stopped wholly within the intersection, on his side of the highway. Thus, if the jury should resolve the conflict of testimony in favor of the plaintiff’s theory of the cause of the accident, there is testimony in the case from which the jury may have found that the accident was directly caused by the failure of the defendant to exercise reasonable care and caution in stopping her automobile, without any contributory negligence on the part of the plaintiff. Again, and quite to the contrary, there is testimony on the part of the defendant, which, if believed, would have been legally sufficient for the jury to have found that the negligence of the plaintiff in driving his truck towards a known dangerous crossing at so great and negligent speed that the truck was consequently out of control and could not be stopped in time to avert a collision with the defendant’s automobile, which had entered the intersection of the highway without an adequate opportunity, because of the obstruction of her view to the right, to observe the rapidity of the rate of the speed at which the plaintiff was driving the truck.

The credible testimony is in direct conflict, but the court cannot determine the issue of fact. There is testimony which supports the charge that the plaintiff was driving the truck at a ³¹⁴ negligent speed before and when the accident occurred. The witnesses who testified for the defendant estimated this speed at from thirty-five to forty-five miles an hour. The statutory law prescribes that no motor vehicle shall be operated recklessly or at a greater rate of speed than is reasonable and proper with regard to the width, traffic and use of the highway, or so as to endanger the life or limb of any person; and, further, that if a motor vehicle shall be operated upon the public highway in the open country, outside of the limits of cities, towns or villages, at a rate of speed in excess of thirty-five miles per hour, such rate of speed shall be prima facie evidence that the person operating such motor vehicle is operating the vehicle at a speed greater than is reasonable and proper.

No motor vehicle shall be operated at a speed greater than forty-five miles an hour under any circumstances or conditions; and if the motor, vehicle be equipped with a commercial body, the weight of which, including the body and the load, is greater than three tons, the vehicle shall not be operated at a rate of speed .greater than thirty-five miles an hour under any