The Queens on the Application of Pryor v Sheffield City Council
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | MR JUSTICE COLLINS |
| Judgment Date | 08 December 2000 |
| Judgment citation (vLex) | [2000] EWHC J1208-6 |
| Court | Queen's Bench Division (Administrative Court) |
| Docket Number | CO/1316/2000 |
| Date | 08 December 2000 |
[2000] EWHC J1208-6
IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE
(THE ADMINISTRATIVE COURT
QUEEN'S BENCH DIVISION
Mr Justice Collins
CO/1316/2000
THE CLAIMANT APPEARED IN PERSON
MR P KOLVIN (instructed by THE SHEFFIELD CITY COUNCIL, LEGAL & ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICES, SHEFFIELD S1 2HH) appeared on behalf of the Defendant.
The applicant, Mr David Pryor, is a retired engineer who lives in Sheffield. He is concerned, among other things, about road safety and, more particularly, he takes the view that road humps are not a sensible method of achieving what they are intended to achieve, namely the slowing of traffic in built-up areas. He has, as a result of this concern, undertaken a considerable amount of research in Sheffield and observation of areas where road humps have been placed by the Council. He has studied the regulations and has taken the view that the siting of road humps by the Council has contravened the relevant provisions of the regulations. He has obtained, permission to seek judicial review of the Council's policy, for want of a better word, in relation to the placing of humps in Sheffield and, if he is correct, he asks the Court to require the Council to remove the humps from places where they should not have been placed. There is what I think Mr Pryor would recognise as a somewhat cheeky claim for damages, but that has not been and, indeed, clearly could not be, pursued.
The point at issue turns upon the meaning of the word "culvert" as used in the relevant regulation. Before I consider the arguments I should set out the statutory background. It was the Transport Act 1981 which first gave power to local authorities to lay road humps in a highway. Such humps would otherwise be an obstruction of the highway and, therefore, specific statutory authorisation was required. The relevant provisions are now contained in section 90A of the Highways Act of 1980, inserted, as I have said, by the Transport Act of 1981. Section 90A(1) provides:
"A highway authority may construct road humps in a highway maintainable at the public expense for which they are the highway authority if-
(a) the highway is subject to a statutory speed limit for motor vehicles of 30 miles per hour or less;"
section 90D(1) provides:
"The Secretary of State may by regulations make such provision in relation to the construction and maintenance of road humps as appears to him to be necessary or expedient in the interests of safety and the free movement of traffic, and may in particular-
(a)…
(b) impose requirements as to
(i) the nature, dimension, location and spacing of road humps;"
Section 90E provides that if a road hump conforms to the regulations it shall not be treated as an obstruction and is lawfully in the highway.
The present regulations are the Highways (Road Humps) Regulations 1999, Statutory Instrument 1999 No 1025.
Regulation 4 is headed "Nature, dimensions and location of road humps" and the relevant paragraph in 4 is paragraph (6) which so far as material reads:
"No road hump shall be constructed or maintained in a highway:
(a)…
(b)…
(c)…
(d) above or within 25 metres of any part of a bridge over which a carriageway of that highway passes or any part of a tunnel, culvert or other similar structure which crosses beneath a carriageway of that highway."
Now the word culvert is perhaps a word not in particularly general usage and Mr Pryor's contention, putting it very briefly, is that the word culvert is apt to include. Any means by which a service is conveyed beneath the surface, whether electricity or telephone cables or any water, effluent or any such matters. It does not include, he accepts, a water main or a gas main because they are recognised to have their own special definition, but otherwise, as I say, it covers anything which conveys something, be it water or other matter, beneath the surface. That being so, it is perhaps obvious that it is difficult to imagine that there are many urban roads which do not contain culverts, in the sense that Mr Pryor says is applicable and, as he fully recognises, and indeed really intends, if he is right, the result will be that there will be precious few, if any, road humps left in any city or town in this country.
That is a result which is perhaps surprising, but, nonetheless, if that is the true construction of the regulation then it must indeed follow, and if Parliament did not intend it then Parliament will have to change the law in an appropriate fashion, submits Mr Pryor. As the law stands the City Council is not able to do what it has been doing.
Now Mr Pryor supports his submission by asking me to look at dictionary definition of the word culvert and he has prayed in aid too the opinion of a gentleman who is a civil engineer with 40 years experience in the road drainage and pipeline construction industry, a Mr Jack Wilson, who lives in Newport. Mr Wilson has placed before the court an affidavit in which he explains his understanding from his, as he puts it, vast and unchallenged experience of the term culvert. What he says, and I quote from his affidavit is this:
"The term CULVERT is defined as being a covered or buried water course of any diameter, from the smallest to the largest, which may convey storm runoff water or foul water to an out fall ie (1) into open ditches. (2) into streams and rivers. (3) into sea or ocean. (4) into a sewage or water treatment facility. They may also carry electric cables, including phone lines. A culvert is the general term describing any man made subterranean structure carrying or diverting the flow of water, or the flow of electricity."
He then refers to various dictionary definitions, some particular to the civil engineering industry, some general. In particular, Mr Pryor, and indeed Mr Wilson, pray in aid the Oxford English Dictionary definition of the word "culvert". Its primary meaning is given as:
"A channel, conduit or tunneled drain of masonry or brick-work conveying a stream of water across beneath a canal, railway embankment, or road; also applied to an arched or barrel-shaped drain or sewer…
But there is a secondary meaning, remedy:-
b. Applied to an underground channel in which electric cables or mains are laid; also called a conduit."
The dictionary contains an interesting historical note on the origin of the word culvert. Its usage is said to have commenced in the late 18th Century in connection with the construction of canals and to have been extended to railways, highways and town drainage. Mr Pryor tells me that he has been informed that the word is derived from a French word and was brought over by English troops or engineers who had been involved in the Napoleonic wars and picked up the term from France. Whatever its precise origin, originally it was the way in which usually a water course was channeled underneath a canal or a railway or a highway. That, I think, is the most obvious use of the word culvert. At some stage, a culvert may become a bridge depending on the size of the opening through which the relevant water course is channeled under the road.
In addition, I suspect many people would think in terms of the word culvert where surface water is drained from the road and runs along a ditch at the side of the road and at some stage is taken under the road to the other side because of either the camber of the road or the fall in the land over which the road is running. When it goes under the road it is quite commonly considered to be in a culvert.
The evidence from the Council suggests that the use as I have indicated, described in the Oxford English Dictionary, as an underground channel in which electric cables or mains are laid is not one which the gentleman in question has come across and he suggests that it is a most unusual use of culvert.
The word itself may be capable of a wide or a narrow meaning but what I have to decide is what is its meaning in the context of the regulation to which I have already referred. I note first, and this is of some importance, that the regulation refers to a tunnel, culvert or other similar structure which crosses beneath the carriageway.
Now many services, for example telephone or electric cables, will run along underneath the highway. They will have branches off to feed houses; often they will run along the pavement but not always, they may well run under the carriageway. "Crosses" is important because it can only be culverts that go under the road surface that would be covered.
Mr Pryor's point is that the purpose behind this regulation quite clearly is to avoid damage to the culverts which run underneath the road. The damage is likely to be caused because having gone over the hump there is an added pressure when the vehicle comes down on the other side and he reminded me that when, for example, in the last war bombs fell in towns it was not merely the hole created by the blast, it was the effect of the pressure from that blast which might be some considerable distance away which could well damage the relevant pipe, channel or whatever.
Now clearly damage to the bridge, tunnel, culvert or other similar structure is what the regulation is concerned about and one therefore sees the force of Mr Pryor's submission. Why should only culverts in the narrow sense be included, when there might equally be damage, for example, to a drain or to a sewer which could have much greater repercussions because it might cause illness as a result, whereas damage merely to where there is surface water or a...
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