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Davis v. Dollar Rent a Car Systems11/17/2004
s to provide an unobstructed view to motorists. Id. at *2. Also, the local government had enacted many ordinances designed to eliminate obstructions to the flow of traffic, but not to visibility. Id. The court also observed that such a common law duty to eliminate obstructions to visibility would make the line between liability and no liability almost impossible to draw and would certainly turn this issue into a battle of experts opining on sight lines and traffic patterns. Id. at *4.
The Hackett court was familiar with the Third District's Evans decision and rejected the dissent's notion that landowner liability could appropriately be decided post-accident on a "reasonableness" basis. Id. The Massachusetts court expressed the view that landowners are entitled to notice of exactly what is expected of them and pointed out that in a judicially-created environment of undefined "reasonableness" a landowner would be prudent to remove all vegetation "that may conceivably be argued one day to violate his duty of care to motorists." Id. If corner properties at intersections are to be made bare of vegetation, this is a decision more appropriately made by the legislature. Unlike Whitt, the Hackett court found it important that Massachusetts courts historically had never imposed a duty on property owners to provide visibility to persons outside the land, observing that, on both large and small tracts of land adjacent to public ways and intersections, standing trees, high hedges and flowering shrubs are customary, even encouraged. Id. at *3.
Although, in his Evans' dissent, Judge Schwartz may have been correct in saying that "the Republic will not fall" solely because the question of a landowner's fault in not providing adequate visibility of approaching traffic to the motoring public is decided by a jury on a case-by-case basis, I question whether it is either fair or desirable to leave entirely to a post-hoc decision by a jury the question whether a landowner has sufficiently accommodated or protected those beyond his property who may benefit from having a clear view across it. Landowners in Florida also have the right to know what is expected of them. If the rule in Florida is going to be that a landowner has a duty to ascertain whether a risk of harm to third parties is affected by conditions on his property and to "see that sufficient precautions are taken to protect" those third parties even from their own negligence, we ought be willing (and able) to define the duty. How many feet of clearance or visibility must they provide? How good does the clearance have to be? Why would this duty not extend to keeping vehicles or other obstructions out of the line of vision? Is the landowner's duty affected by the public authority's decisions as to speed and traffic control? If, for example, there had been a traffic signal at this intersection instead of a "yield" sign, the accident would likely not have occurred. Or, if it had occurred even though a traffic light controlled the intersection, would the majority's conclusion that Williams owed a duty to Green be the same? Why shouldn't the public body be required to provide traffic control to meet the conditions on the adjacent property instead of requiring the landowner to maintain his property in light of the public body's decisions on traffic control?
There are several photographs of this intersection in the record, but many are photocopies. The setting does not appear to be urban, but it is difficult to characterize the location absolutely as being "rural." It is conceded, however, that the Williams' property is not used commercially. The principals to the accident were not invitees and were not enticed to the intersection by any commercial use at th
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