King Lifting Ltd v Oxfordshire County Council
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | HHJ Reddihough |
| Judgment Date | 20 July 2016 |
| Neutral Citation | [2016] EWHC 1767 (QB) |
| Docket Number | Case No: HQ14X01945 |
| Court | Queen's Bench Division |
| Date | 20 July 2016 |
[2016] EWHC 1767 (QB)
IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE
QUEEN'S BENCH DIVISION
Royal Courts of Justice
Strand, London, WC2A 2LL
His Honour Judge Reddihough
(Sitting as a Judge of the High Court)
Case No: HQ14X01945
Mr Robert Stokell (instructed by Plexus Law Ltd) for the Claimant
Mr Patrick Hennessy (instructed by Clyde & Co) for the Defendant
Hearing dates: 8, 9, 10 and 15 June 2016
Judgment Approved
This case concerns a road accident which occurred on 16 th July 2012 on Woodeaton Road, near Woodeaton, Oxfordshire. The claimant is a crane hire company which operates a fleet of cranes and the defendant (hereinafter referred to as "the council") is the highway authority in respect of Woodeaton Road under the Highways Act, 1980.
At about 6 p.m. on the day in question, a Demag AC60–3 All-Terrain Mobile Crane owned by the claimant was being driven southbound along Woodeaton Road by Mr. Lee Lawrence, an employee of the claimant, when it came off the carriageway and toppled over into a brook, known as Bayswater Brook, which ran alongside the road. The place where the accident occurred was at the end of a section of the road on which the southbound carriageway had been closed to allow for some proposed road works. This section of the road was controlled by temporary traffic lights. In fact, the road was due to be closed from the next day for the works to be carried out.
Fortunately, Mr. Lawrence did not suffer any significant injury, but the crane was badly damaged. The claimant's claim for damages is in respect of the costs of the recovery and repair of the crane and associated losses. The quantum of the claimant's claim has been agreed, subject to liability, in the sum of £260,000 inclusive of interest. The council has a counterclaim against the claimant for the costs of repairing damage to the road caused in the recovery of the crane. The quantum of the counterclaim has been agreed, again subject to liability, in the sum of £11,500 inclusive of interest.
Whilst various matters concerning the road and the accident are not in dispute, a central issue in the case is the cause of the crane leaving the carriageway and toppling into the brook. It is the claimant's case that the eastern edge of the road surface cracked or collapsed beneath the crane, as a result of which it went onto the soft verge which gave way under the crane, causing it to topple over. It is the council's case that the crane driver, Mr. Lawrence, drove the crane off the carriageway, causing the verge to collapse and the crane to topple over.
The claimant claims that the council was in breach of its duty under Section 41 of the Highways Act, 1980, in that it failed to maintain the carriageway and verge of Woodeaton Road and was negligent at common law in various respects regarding the inspection and maintenance of the road, the safety of the road, and the layout of the traffic management system for the proposed road works.
The council denies that it was in breach of its duty under Section 41 of the 1980 Act and relies upon the statutory defence contained in Section 58 of the Act. It further denies any negligence and asserts that the sole cause of the accident was the negligence of the crane driver in driving the crane off the carriageway.
The evidence on behalf of the claimant consisted of witness statements and oral evidence from Mr. Lawrence, the crane driver, and Mr. Martin New, the claimant's group operations manager, together with reports and oral evidence from expert witnesses, namely Mr. Philip Mottram in the field of accident reconstruction and Mr. Michael Widdowson regarding highways inspection and maintenance.
The council relied upon the witness statements of Mr. Michael Dickerson, a highways inspector (who could not attend the trial due to illness), and the witness statements and oral evidence from Mr. Robert Burgess, a senior technician in the council's highways team, and Mr. Andrew Vidovic, a senior engineer in the council's bridges team. The council's expert evidence consisted of reports and oral evidence from Mr. Andrew Hill (accident reconstruction) and Mr. Mike Hopwood (highways inspection and maintenance). Mr. Mottram and Mr. Hill had prepared a joint statement setting out the matters upon which they agreed and disagreed, as had Mr. Widdowson and Mr. Hopwood.
In reaching my conclusions in this case, I have regard to all of the evidence referred to above and to the helpful oral and written submissions of counsel.
It is appropriate to set out some of the relevant matters which do not appear to be in dispute. Woodeaton Road is an unclassified two way rural road subject to the national speed limit which runs south to north from the A40 trunk road to Woodeaton village. Bayswater Brook runs alongside the road's southern end over a distance of about 0.8 miles, with the width of the grass verge between the carriageway and the brook varying at different locations. On Elsfield Road near to the junction with the southern end of Woodeaton Road was a sign prohibiting goods vehicles in excess of 7.5 tonnes from using Woodeaton Road "except for access". There was also a sign which said "Unsuitable for HGVs". It is accepted that heavy vehicles did use Woodeaton Road for access to Woodeaton and other locations on the road and that it was regularly used by large farm vehicles, particularly during the harvest season.
The crane involved in the accident has a lifting capacity of 60 tonnes. It has a front, middle and rear axle to each of which were fitted single wheels and tyres on each side. The load on each axle was 12,000 kilograms, so the total axle load was about 36 tonnes. There is 2.835 metres between the centres of the front wheel and the middle wheel, and 1.650 metres between the centres of the middle and rear wheels. The cab of the crane extends across the full width of the front of the crane and the driver's position is on the left hand side of the cab, about 2.5 metres ahead of the front wheels. The front nearside tyre is approximately 390 mm. wide and the width across the vehicle between the outer edges of the front nearside and offside tyres is approximately 2.5 metres. The overall length of the crane is 11.625 metres.
On 12 th January 2012, the highway inspector, Mr. Dickerson, noted some erosion of the verge by the brook along a section of about 25 metres of Woodeaton Road, some 50 metres or so north of the location where the accident in question subsequently occurred. Because of the proximity of the road to the brook, a protective mesh fence and cones were placed along this section of the road where the erosion had occurred. On 17 th February 2012 some 15–20 metres of the verge in this section was found to have collapsed into the brook. Therefore, temporary traffic lights were installed and the collapsed section coned off to keep traffic away from it. Effectively, this meant traffic in each direction had to travel along the northbound lane. It was intended in due course that repair work would be carried out by the council. On 22 nd February 2012 the traffic management system was reinforced by the placing of water-filled barriers along the section, in addition to cones. Various road signs were erected in conjunction with this traffic light managed system. It was this traffic management system which was in place at the time of the accident on 16 th July 2012.
The court has been assisted by a considerable number of photographs of the eroded section of verge and the traffic management system before and on the day of the accident; of the accident scene showing the toppled over crane in the brook and the state of the road and verge; and of the remedial work carried out on the road subsequent to the accident.
I now turn to the evidence given in the trial. In his witness statement, the crane driver, Mr. Lawrence, stated that he had received training on the crane involved in the accident and had operated it on a number of other occasions. He had worked for the claimant for approximately three years and before that he had been employed as a mobile crane driver and operator for about twenty years. He described that on the day of the accident he had planned out his route to the school at Woodeaton where he was required to operate the crane to install some portacabins. He checked the internet that morning for any road alerts and the defendant's website. He saw no notices posted to advise that Woodeaton Road was unsuitable for heavy vehicles or there were any road works on it. In fact, he found that there were road works on Woodeaton Road and he drove through them on the northbound carriageway. He said that so far as possible, because of the size of the crane, he drove in the middle of the road.
He then described how the accident occurred when he was driving back along Woodeaton Road from the school. He said that he drove through the road works section on the northbound lane and then, at the point where he exited the road works, the northbound vehicles were waiting stationary behind the traffic lights. There was a white van at the head of the queue of vehicles behind the traffic lights, which had overshot the stop marker by about three inches. He said the van then reversed back to provide sufficient room for the crane to exit the road works. Mr. Lawrence said that, in order to avoid the vehicles on the other side of the road behind the traffic lights, he had to use the whole width of the southbound carriageway. He was driving at no more than 5 m.p.h. and was careful to ensure that he remained on the carriageway and did not drive onto the verge. He had straightened the crane on the southbound carriageway adjacent to the traffic lights when suddenly and without warning the edge of the southbound carriageway...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Demetrios Karpasitis v Hertfordshire County Council
...of verges is to support the carriageway, not to provide a safety buffer for overrunning vehicles: King Lifting Ltd v Oxfordshire CC [2016] EWHC 1767 (QB). Section 58 30 The non-statutory Code of Practice is not a mandatory standard although it is evidence of good practice. Highway Authorit......