Opinion ID: 2370776
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Negligent maintenance, repair, inspection, and operation

Text: With respect to her allegation regarding the maintenance, repair, inspection, and operation of the escalators, Ms. Barksdale-Showell relies upon WMATA's Severe Weather Plan Alert that was issued the evening prior to her accident. This Alert required custodians to arrive at their respective Metrorail stations by 5:00 a.m. on December 20, 2000, the day of her accident. She also relies upon WMATA's SSOPs, which directed station managers to ensure that hazardous areas were not accessible to passengers, and to frequently inspect station interiors for unsafe conditions which MUST be rendered safe IMMEDIATELY by correcting the fault if possible, or by keeping ... passengers away from the affected area. Even assuming, arguendo, that WMATA's custodian at the Anacostia station violated this mandatory portion of the Alert by not arriving by the appointed time [5] , we note that there was nothing in the Alert or the relevant SSOPs that mandated certain actions to be taken. The fact that the internal operating procedure about the requirement of rendering a hazard safe contains an element of discretion (if possible), which undermines any claim by Ms. Barksdale-Showell that WMATA employees were bound to follow a specific directive. A fair reading of the procedure contemplates that upon encountering a hazard, the employee is vested with a decision of whether the hazard can be rendered safe, how it may be rendered safe, and whether the employee will actually render it safe. See Robinson, supra note 1, 676 A.2d at 473-75 (holding that use of mandatory and permissive language in WMATA SSOPs did not require station manager to take a specific course of action so decision was discretionary); Gaubert, supra, 499 U.S. at 324, 111 S.Ct. 1267 ([I]f a regulation allows the employee discretion, the existence of the regulation creates a strong presumption that a discretionary act authorized by the regulation involves consideration of the same policies which lead to the promulgation of the regulations.). At the least, the procedure contemplates that there will be some hazards that cannot possibly be corrected. While there is a colorable argument that this SSOP requires WMATA to keep passengers away from the affected areas, the analysis under the second step forecloses this possible ground for liability. We now turn to whether the discretion exercised over the maintenance, repair, inspection, and operation of the escalators is subject to policy analysis and thus discretionary. We must determine whether the trial court correctly determined that WMATA's responses to the wet conditions in the station [were] of the kind that the [discretionary function exception] was designed to shield. Gaubert, supra, 499 U.S. at 323, 111 S.Ct. 1267. Paul Gillum, Jr., the head of the Office of Plant Maintenance at WMATA, explained that WMATA's policy has been to allow the wet floors, wet platforms, and wet escalators to dry by evaporation because WMATA would be required to turn off its escalators to hand dry its escalator steps and that activity would interrupt the efficient movement of passengers through the Metrorail system, and inconvenience passengers desiring to use the escalators, which would be particularly problematic and harmful during rush hour. He further explained that the decision not to mop or dry the tile floors was because it would be costly and ineffective in terms of requiring the deployment of additional employees to continuously mop and dry in and around the feet of walking passengers, who would continue to enter and deposit moisture at the time that WMATA was attempting to dry the floors, [rendering] the drying effort futile. WMATA thus concluded that its resources [we]re appropriately committed to clearing or treating snow and ice from exterior sidewalks and parking lots... rather than to the hopeless tasks of drying floors, platforms, and escalators which are continuously in use and operation. These actions are consistent with WMATA's statutory purpose of operating improved transit facilities ... as part of a balanced regional system of transportation and mission of providing public transportation and its policy of keep[ing] all stations, and all escalators in those stations, operating during inclement weather, if at all possible, in order to serve the public's need for mass transportation balanced against its ability to fulfill that mandate in an efficient and effective manner. § 9-1107.01(2). Indeed, during the morning rush hours (5:30 to 7:00 a.m.) of Ms. Barksdale-Showell's accident, more than 2,500 passengers entered the Anacostia station. This is precisely the sort of social, economic, and political policy-based judgment that this court and federal circuit courts confronting similar issues have held to be immunized from liability. [6] See Smith v. Washington Metro. Area Transit Auth., 290 F.3d 201, 209 (4th Cir.2002) (holding that WMATA's decision to permit passengers to choose between walking on a stationary escalator or riding an elevator was one that implicated potential economic and political costs ... in choosing between such unattractive resolutions of its problems and might well have resulted in public outrage, adverse media coverage, or political fallout); McKethean, supra, 588 A.2d at 713-14 (holding that WMATA's decision not to relocate a bus stop involved safety planning and weighing of various alternatives, in the absence of specific safety guidelines, which was immune from liability). The situation at the Anacostia station required WMATA to establish priorities for the accomplishment of its policy objectives by balancing the objectives sought to be obtained against such practical considerations as staffing and funding, which this court should decline to second-guess. Varig Airlines, supra note 2, 467 U.S. at 820, 104 S.Ct. 2755.