Opinion ID: 2275645
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Minimal Duty Imposed at Private Crossings

Text: Having resolved the threshold issuedetermining that the crossing is privatewe next consider the duties our common law imposes on CSX. At private crossings, our century-old precedent states that a railroad is not liable for injuries to a traveler at [a private] crossing unless after discovery of his peril, they fail to use all means to avoid the accident. Hunt's Adm'r, 254 S.W.2d at 707; see also, Chesapeake & O. Ry. Co. v. Hunter's Adm'r, 170 Ky. 4, 185 S.W. 140 (1916); Stull's Adm'x, 189 S.W. at 723-24 (stating that railroad operators must attempt to avoid the injury if they observe the peril in time). Thus at private crossings, a railway company owes no duty of lookout or warning. Hunt's Adm'r, 254 S.W.2d at 706-707 (emphasis added). Additionally, and central to the present case, a railroad has no duty to clear vegetation at private crossings. Spalding v. Louisville & N.R. Co., 281 Ky. 357, 136 S.W.2d 1 (1940). Spalding involved an allegation that the railroad allowed bushes and weeds to grow up on its right-of-way adjacent to the crossing, which obstructed the driver's view. Utilizing the law of easements, we held that the landowner, as the dominant estate holder, was responsible for vegetation removal. Id. at 3. The railroad, as servient owner, had no duty to maintain in any way the safety of the private passway for travel. Id. We further concluded that as long as the dominant estate owner is not causing any unnecessary injury to the crossing, he may enter upon the servient estate to make whatever repairs were necessary for the safe use of [the crossing]. Id. That is not to say, however, that the crossing may not become ultra-hazardous because of such growthan issue we will discuss later. With this framework in mind, we turn to the present case to examine whether CSX breached its duty by failing to utilize all means to avoid the accident after it discovered Mary Calhoun's peril. Although difficult to discern due to the structure of Appellants' brief, it does not appear that Appellants actually address whether CSX breached this duty. [14] Rather, they claim that whether CSX had a duty to avoid the accident after discovering [Mary's] peril on the tracks is not what this appeal is about. Instead Appellants propose a significant change in Kentucky railroad law and urge this Court to adopt a new rule based on the universal doctrine of care doctrine as stated in Claywell. Grayson Fraternal Order of Eagles, Aerie No. 3738, Inc. v. Claywell, 736 S.W.2d 328 (Ky.1987). Appellants ask us to discard our long-standing, clearly delineated private crossing precedents, and adopt a new framework that everyone owes everyone else a duty to act reasonably to prevent foreseeable harm to the other. Appellants are not asking us to utilize broad strokes to re-paint this area, but rather they request that we essentially whitewash the entire common law framework created over the last two centuries. In its place, Appellants ask us to implement the amorphous standard that everyone owes everyone else a duty. At the outset, the lack of any specificity or contours to Appellants' proposed framework is troublesome. The practicality of replacing over a century's worth of private crossing tort lawand we might add, other specific tort lawand replacing it with a very general duty of care is dubious, at best. Furthermore, Claywell was a dram shop liability case, which utilized the universal duty of care doctrine to expose the archaic common law doctrine that a tavern owner never owes a duty to a third person injured by an intoxicated customer. Claywell is inapposite to the present case due to the absence of an equivalent to the no duty common law rule in the railroad crossing paradigm. As detailed above, at private crossings, a railroad has a duty to exercise ordinary care to avoid injuring a person after it discovers her peril. Therefore, we find the comparison unpersuasive and consequently, decline the invitation to alter our well-established precedent defining the duty owed at private crossings.