Court Opinion

ID: 9643496
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 20:31:28.263583+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:05:15.921007
License: Public Domain

PELLEGRINI, Judge,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent. The yellow nylon rope tied between trees and signs to prevent *69access to Broad Street being prepared for the 1994 Mummer’s Day Parade was not a traffic control device but a crowd control device and, accordingly, does not fall within the traffic control exception to governmental immunity. 42 Pa.C.S. § 8542(b)(4).1 In addition, I believe the majority opinion is at variance with numerous decisions of this court.
At approximately 6:00 a.m., on January 1, 1994, Paul T. Pettineo (Pettineo), responding to his car alarm and seeing that his vehicle was about to be towed away, ran out of his house and was “clotheslined”, i.e., was caught about the neck and knocked to the ground by a portion of yellow nylon rope placed on the sidewalk adjacent to 1807 South Broad Street. City of Philadelphia (City) police officers had tied the rope between trees and signs adjacent to that portion of Broad Street to prevent anyone in the crowd that was observing the 1994 Mummer’s Day Parade from crossing the parade route at that point.
The majority reverses the trial court’s grant of the City’s motion for judgment n.o.v. because the rope was erected to control “pedestrians” under Section 102 of the Vehicle Code, 75 Pa.C.S. § 102, making the rope a “traffic control device.” The relevant definitions provided in Section 102 are as follows:
“Official traffic-control devices.” Signs, signals, markings and devices not inconsistent with this title placed or erected by authority of a public body or official having jurisdiction, for the purpose of regulating warning or guiding traffic.
“Pedestrian.” A natural person afoot [i.e., travelling on foot],
“Traffic.” Pedestrians, ridden or herded animals, vehicles, streetcars and other conveyances, whether singly or together, using any highway for purposes of travel.
“Traffic-control signal.” A device, whether manually, electrically or mechanically operated, by which traffic is alternately directed to stop and permitted to proceed. (Emphasis in original).
Because the yellow rope in question controls pedestrians and pedestrians fall within the definition of traffic, the majority then concludes that the yellow rope must necessarily be a traffic control device. Under the majority’s interpretation of those provisions, the velvet ropes hung on stanchions at municipally-owned museums to control patrons when looking at works of art are traffic control devices as well.
While the above example is extreme, it illustrates that a traffic control device is a device that is used to regulate, warn or guide traffic on “any highway for purposes of travel”, not just to control people. 75 Pa.C.S. § 102. The yellow rope did not act to facilitate the highway for purposes of travel because it was not placed to act as a “traffic control signal” to control vehicles or pedestrians because Broad Street was closed. When a street is used for a parade, it is the antithesis of what is considered travel — the movement of vehicles or pedestrians from one place to another — as anyone who has to drive blocks or miles to outflank a parade knows. The sole purpose of the rope placed by the City was to control the crowd gathered along Broad Street for the 1994 Mummer’s Day Parade making the rope a crowd control device, not a traffic control device, and making any use of these definitions improper because they simply do not apply.
In holding that the yellow rope directs traffic and not crowds, the majority then goes on to hold that the yellow rope is a traffic control device because it falls within the definition of “markings” as defined by PennDot’s regulations. 67 Pa.Code § 211.1 *70defines “markings” as “a device ... set into the surface, applied upon, or attached to the pavement or curbing or to objects adjacent to the right-of-way.” Because the yellow rope was “attached” to trees and signs along Broad Street, the majority holds that that makes the rope a marking, and if it is a marking, it necessarily is a traffic control device. However, this interpretation ignores that this provision, when defining a marking, uses the language “set into the surface” and “applied upon”, envisioning that a marking is something more permanent than a rope. While this provision does use the term “attached ... to objects”, when read together with the other terms, it envisions the use of bolts and the like to attach the markings, not some temporary attachment as we have here. This is confirmed by PennDot regulations that delineate acceptable pedestrian traffic controls. See 67 Pa.Code 211.271. All of the traffic control devices set forth in that regulation are signs that are affixed by bolts and control the movement of pedestrians in relationship to vehicle traffic, not surprisingly because PennDot’s purpose is not to design or approve signs for parades or street fairs.
Moreover, the majority’s holding is at variance with other holdings of this court interpreting these provisions to mean permanent types of markings engineered in advance to move traffic and are not ad hoc or implemented for a special purpose. For example, a state highway median is not a traffic control device but part of the highway, see Slough v. City of Philadelphia, 686 A.2d 62 (Pa.Cmwlth.1996); a police officer directing traffic is not a traffic control device because the exception applies to inanimate objects, Robinson v. City of Philadelphia, 666 A.2d 1141 (Pa.Cmwlth.1995); flares placed on the highway to advise of icy conditions are not traffic control devices, Miseo v. Ross Township Police Department, 147 Pa.Cmwlth. 268, 607 A.2d 806 (Pa.Cmwlth.1992); a bus stop is not traffic control, Garrett by Garrett v. Moyston, 127 Pa.Cmwlth. 488, 562 A.2d 386 (Pa.Cmwlth.1989); and a school bus lights is not a traffic device even though all cars are required to stop when its lights are flashing, Aberant v. Wilkes-Barre Area School District, 89 Pa.Cmwlth. 516, 492 A.2d 1186 (Pa.Cmwlth.1985). In view of all these cases that have held that markings or devices that have an impact on vehicle traffic are not traffic control devices, then neither is a yellow rope to control a crowd at a parade.
Because the rope is not a “traffic control device” under Section 8542(b)(4) of the Act, I would affirm the trial court’s granting of the City’s post-trial motion for judgment n.o.v. Accordingly, I dissent.

. This exception provides in relevant part:
(b) Acts which may impose liability. — The following acts by a local agency or any of its employees may result in the imposition of liability on a local agency: ... (4) Trees, traffic controls and street lighting. — A dangerous condition of trees, traffic signs, lights or other traffic controls, street lights or street lighting systems under the care, custody or control of the local agency, except that the claimant to recover must establish that the dangerous condition created a reasonably foreseeable risk of the kind of injury which was incurred and that the local agency had actual notice or could reasonably be charged with notice under the circumstances of the dangerous condition at a sufficient time prior to the event to have taken measures to protect against the dangerous condition. (Emphasis in original.)