Opinion
A151895
04-27-2018
JULIO LEMUS VILLA, Plaintiff and Appellant, v. CITY OF SANTA ROSA et al., Defendants and Respondents.
NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN OFFICIAL REPORTS
California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115. (Sonoma County Super. Ct. No. SCV258682)
Julio Villa was struck by a car late at night as he was walking along State Highway 12. At issue here is whether the trial court properly sustained a demurrer to Villa's complaint against the City of Santa Rosa (the City) premised on an alleged failure to provide and maintain adequate street lighting in the vicinity of the accident. The trial court correctly applied settled law to conclude Villa failed to state a cause of action against the City, so we affirm.
BACKGROUND
The operative allegations are from the second amended complaint (the complaint). Villa alleged he was hit by a passing car as he walked home "along the shoulder, inside the 'fog line' of Highway 12 in the City of Santa Rosa." Highway 12 had no sidewalks "or any other safe alternatives available for individuals travelling by foot," but it was the shortest and most direct route to Villa's home. As he walked he saw some lighted streetlights "and therefore could reasonably assume there would be streetlights on."
Villa also sued the driver, Benjamin Scott. His action against Scott is not involved in this appeal.
The complaint alleged that the City installed streetlights along Highway 12 to alleviate the danger posed by the lack of a sidewalk or walking path, but failed to adequately install, maintain and operate them. At the time of Villa's accident, six of eight streetlights in the vicinity were off, one was on, and one was fluctuating on and off. According to the complaint, "[t]he collision was caused by . . . lack of street lights, inoperable street lights and unsafe design creating a dangerous condition of public property for Plaintiff and the public at large."
The court sustained the City's demurrers to Villa's initial and first amended complaints on the ground, in essence, that the City had no general duty to maintain street lighting unless an existing dangerous condition (other than the lack of lighting itself) necessitated lighting to make the streets safe for travel. Villa's second amended complaint added allegations that "Sonoma County Transit had a public transportation route that traveled along Highway 12 in Santa Rosa" and its passengers "would exit from the public transportation along the route, including the vicinity where the Incident giving rise to this Complaint occurred." The court ruled the added allegations failed to establish the City had a duty to light its public streets or that its failure to do so created an actionable dangerous condition.
Villa timely appealed from the ensuing judgment.
DISCUSSION
I. Standard of Review
On appeal from a judgment after a demurrer is sustained without leave to amend, we review the trial court's ruling de novo, exercising our independent judgment on whether the complaint states a cause of action. (Lazar v. Hertz Corp. (1999) 69 Cal.App.4th 1494.) " 'We treat the demurrer as admitting all material facts properly pleaded, but not contentions, deductions or conclusions of fact or law. [Citation.] We also consider matters which may be judicially noticed.' [Citation.] Further, we give the complaint a reasonable interpretation, reading it as a whole and its parts in their context. [Citation.] When a demurrer is sustained, we determine whether the complaint states facts sufficient to constitute a cause of action." (Blank v. Kirwan (1985) 39 Cal.3d 311, 318.)
"The existence of a dangerous condition is ordinarily a question of fact[,] but it can be decided as a matter of law if reasonable minds can come to only one conclusion." (Bonanno v. Central Contra Costa Transit Authority (2003) 30 Cal.4th 139, 148.)
II. Analysis
Under Government Code section 835, "[e]xcept as provided by statute, a public entity is liable for injury caused by a dangerous condition of its property if the plaintiff establishes that the property was in a dangerous condition at the time of the injury, that the injury was proximately caused by the dangerous condition, that the dangerous condition created a reasonably foreseeable risk of the kind of injury which was incurred, and that either: [¶] (a) A negligent or wrongful act or omission of an employee of the public entity within the scope of his employment created the dangerous condition; or [¶] (b) The public entity had actual or constructive notice of the dangerous condition . . . a sufficient time prior to the injury to have taken measures to protect against the dangerous condition."
Villa asserts he adequately alleged a cause of action under Government Code section 835 based on the City's failure to inspect and maintain the street lights on Highway 12 in the vicinity of his accident. This is so, he argues, because the City would not have installed street lights there unless it knew it was a dangerous roadway; Villa had "no other choice" than to walk along the shoulder because there was no sidewalk; and walking along a highway at night without lighting is "somewhat dangerous in the abstract," and of particular risk to passengers alighting from public transit along Highway 12. We disagree.
Mixon v. State of California (2012) 207 Cal.App.4th 124, 132-134 (Mixon) summarizes the applicable law. There a motorist struck and injured a child walking with his family in a crosswalk at night. (Id. at p. 129.) The plaintiffs sued the state and PG&E for inadequately lighting and configuring the intersection. (Ibid.) The court of appeal affirmed summary judgment in favor of the defendants. (Id. at pp. 132-133.) It explained: "Plaintiffs' argument is a variant of the claim that a public entity is negligent for failing to provide streetlights—a claim that has long been rejected. A public entity is under no duty to light its streets. [Citation.] ' "In the absence of a statutory or charter provision to the contrary, it is generally held that a municipality is under no duty to light its streets even though it is given the power to do so, and hence, that its failure to light them is not actionable negligence, and will not render it liable in damages to a traveler who is injured solely by reason thereof." ' [Citations.] A duty to light, 'and the consequent liability for failure to do so,' may arise only if there is 'some peculiar condition rendering lighting necessary in order to make the streets safe for travel.' [Citation.] In other words, a prior dangerous condition may require street lighting or other means to lessen the danger but the absence of street lighting is itself not a dangerous condition.
"Several cases are instructive. In Antenor,[] two pedestrians struck by a motorist while crossing a city street claimed the intersection was in a dangerous condition because, among other things, the street lighting was too dim. [Citation.] The trial court granted a directed verdict to the city and the Court of Appeal affirmed. [Citation.] The Court of Appeal acknowledged evidence that the lighting intensity was below government guidelines but found that the city had no duty 'to light its streets in the first instance' and thus was not negligent for failing to provide brighter lights. [Citation.]
Antenor v. City of Los Angeles (1985) 174 Cal.App.3d 477 --------
In Plattner v. City of Riverside (1999) 69 Cal.App.4th 1441, 1443 [(Plattner)], a pedestrian was struck by a motorist in a dark crosswalk with a nonfunctioning city streetlight. Summary judgment for the city was affirmed because the city had 'no duty to provide street lighting and, therefore, ha[d] no duty to maintain that lighting, even at a crosswalk.' (Ibid.) The court stated: 'Plaintiff does not claim and consequently has not shown there was anything dangerous about the crosswalk other than the absence of light. But darkness is a naturally occurring condition that the city is under no duty to eliminate. Thus, the fortuity of locating the streetlight at a spot where it illuminates the crosswalk does not render the crosswalk dangerous without the light. [¶] Nor do we share plaintiff's view that by providing a crosswalk and thereby encouraging pedestrians to cross the street at that location the city invited the public to rely on the streetlight and thus created a duty to maintain the light. . . . '[I]t is obvious to all when a streetlight is out. Therefore, a pedestrian such as plaintiff cannot claim she relied on the inoperative streetlight in order to cross the street. Moreover, unlike traffic lights and stop signs which are the only means by which traffic is controlled, streetlights are not the only or even the primary means by which streets are illuminated for vehicular traffic. Vehicle headlamps are designed and used for that purpose.' " (Mixon, supra, 207 Cal.App.4th at p. 133-134.)
Mixon also affirmed summary judgment for PG&E under the principle that a public utility cannot be charged with greater liability in this regard than the public entity itself. The court cited White v. Southern Edison Co. (1994) 25 Cal.App.4th 442 (White) for its holding that there is no liability " 'where (1) the installation of the streetlight is not necessary to obviate a dangerous condition, i.e., there is a duty to install the streetlight and a concomitant duty to maintain it; (2) the failure to maintain an installed streetlight does not create a risk greater than the risk created by the total absence of a streetlight; and (3) the injured party has not in some manner relied on the operation of the streetlight foregoing other protective actions, e.g., a pedestrian chooses a particular route home in reliance on the available street lighting when the pedestrian would have chosen a different route or a different means of transportation in the absence of lighting.' " (Mixon, supra, 207 Cal.App.4th at pp. 139-140.) These firmly established principles apply here and require dismissal for the same reasons.
Villa attempts to distinguish Mixon, Antenor, Plattner and White because they involved pedestrians injured in inadequately or unlit crosswalks or intersections, while he was hit while walking along the shoulder of the highway. The distinction is meaningless. We see no reason in logic or policy that a municipality should have a general duty to light the shoulder of a highway when the law is clear it has no such duty to provide adequate light at crosswalks and intersections, where there is more likely to be foot traffic and where pedestrians must cross against oncoming vehicles.
Nor has Villa alleged a prior dangerous condition "rendering lighting necessary in order to make the streets safe for travel" that may give rise to a duty to light. (Mixon, supra, 207 Cal.App.4th at p. 133.) It is not quite clear from Villa's briefs whether he claims that the absence of a sidewalk along Highway 12 constitutes such a "peculiar condition" (ibid) in and of itself, but, if so, we disagree. To accept that proposition would, again, produce the anomalous result that a city generally has no duty to illuminate its crosswalks, which are designed for pedestrian safety against oncoming traffic, but is liable, without more, for failing to adequately light the shoulders of unimproved highways. That is not the law.
We furthermore agree with the trial court that the allegation that people enter and exit public transit along Highway 12 does nothing to demonstrate a preexisting condition of the road, other than poor lighting, made it dangerous. Finally, Villa has not alleged he forwent other routes home in reliance on the streetlights he observed that were operational. "[It] is not enough that the pedestrian relied on the streetlight. Liability predicated on the city's failure to maintain the light requires both reliance and foregoing other protective action. This exception to the general rule of nonliability anticipates a pedestrian who has taken a particular route based on the belief the route is lighted and does not discover otherwise until it is too late to take a different route." (Plattner, supra, 69 Cal.App.4th at p. 1446, italics added [affirming summary judgment where plaintiff "neither relied on the light nor eschewed other protective action in choosing to cross at that location".]) Villa argues he had "no other choice" than to walk along Highway 12 to return home, but, after two opportunities to amend, his complaint alleged only that he could "reasonably assume" there would be lighting and that Highway 12 was "the shortest and most direct" route.
The trial court correctly sustained the demurrer.
DISPOSITION
The judgment is affirmed.
/s/_________
Siggins, J. We concur: /s/_________
Pollak, Acting P.J. /s/_________
Jenkins, J.