Opinion ID: 2279774
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Sufficient Evidence Supported the Jury's Implicit Best-Use Finding

Text: The Airport Board's main argument, at trial and on appeal, is that Baston failed to prove that her property was physically adaptable for industrial uses. Using computer-generated diagrams, the Airport Board's architectural and engineering experts purported to show that tractor-trailers could not, within the existing right-of-way, negotiate the hairpin turn between Hill Road and Hossman Road. Because, according to the Airport Board, enlarging the road and fixing the curve would be exorbitantly expensive, the Baston property could not be deemed adaptable to industrial use. Baston's engineering expert disagreed. He testified that he was familiar with the sort of software the Airport Board's engineer had employed and that it tended to depict what would be the most desirable conditions in an ideal world, but that it did not exhaust what could be done in the real world. He testified that he had inspected Hill Road and its curve and that based on his forty years of experience helping to develop industrial sites and his personal knowledge of several Boone County industrial sites served by similarly narrow roads with sharp turns (which he named and described), he believed the Hill Road curve could be ameliorated to permit tractor-trailer use. This testimony was consistent with that of Mrs. Baston, who testified that school buses and all manner of trucks, including tractor-trailers, had navigated the Hill Road curve. Characterizing the engineer's testimony as bald and wholly unsupported, the Court of Appeals' majority agreed with the Airport Board that Baston had failed to show that the property was capable of industrial use. We disagree. Mrs. Baston's engineer was duly qualified by training and long experience to form an opinion about the amenability of Hill Road and its sharp turn to tractor-trailer traffic. His testimony was supported by the several real-world, Boone County examples he cited where similarly narrow roads with sharp turns had not foreclosed industrial development. His testimony was also supported by that of Mrs. Baston, who indicated, contrary to the computer model representations of the Airport Board's experts, that she was aware from living in the area for over forty years that it was possible for trucks to negotiate the Hill Road turn. Under KRE 702, the admissibility of expert testimony is a matter entrusted to the discretion of the trial court. The Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company v. Thompson, 11 S.W.3d 575 (Ky.2000). The trial court did not abuse that discretion by admitting the testimony of Baston's well-qualified engineer. Once it is properly admitted, [evaluation of the weight which should be given to expert testimony is the exclusive province of the jury. Ellison v. R & B Contracting, Inc., 32 S.W.3d 66, 76 (Ky. 2000). A reviewing court may overturn a jury's verdict only when it is so flagrantly against the weight of the evidence as to indicate passion or prejudice. Denzik v. Denzik, 197 S.W.3d 108, 110 (Ky.2006) (citing Bierman v. Klapheke, 967 S.W.2d 16 (Ky.1998)). The jury here was not obliged to accept the Airport Board's expert evidence uncritically, nor was it obliged to discount Baston's evidence merely because her engineer did not engage in a battle of computer-generated diagrams. On cross-examination, he was asked if he understood the turning radius requirements of tractor-trailers. He testified that he did and still maintained that the Hill Road turn could accommodate tractor-trailer traffic. The Airport Board was free to cross-examine further the basis of the engineer's opinion, but it chose not to do so. The jury could reasonably rely on the engineer's testimony to conclude that Hill Road did not pose the insurmountable obstacle to industrial use that the Airport Board claimed. The Court of Appeals usurped the jury's role by ruling otherwise.