RULWA immunity does not apply to a paved inner-city playground and recreation center where the plaintiff fell in a hole in the black-topped surface between the basketball court and the bocee court because “[w]hen a recreational facility has been designed with improvements that require regular maintenance to be safely used and enjoyed, the owner of the facility has a duty to maintain the improvements”
How later courts described this case
- RULWA immunity does not apply to a paved inner-city playground and recreation center where the plaintiff fell in a hole in the black-topped surface between the basketball court and the bocee court because “[w]hen a recreational facility has been designed with improvements that require regular maintenance to be safely used and enjoyed, the owner of the facility has a duty to maintain the improvements”
- holding plaintiff could recover under recreational use statute where injury occurred on city's basketball court
- holding that Act does not apply to inner-city playground
- refusing to apply the RUA where doing so “would be to ignore the purpose of the Act and to disregard the expectations of the users of such a facility”
Written by the judges who cited it.
The opinion
McDERMOTT, Justice,
dissenting.
I dissent from the opinion of the majority for several reasons. The first reason concerns the statement contained in footnote 3, which recites that the appellee, City of Philadelphia, waived the defense of immunity under the Political Subdivision Tort Claims Act, 42 Pa.C.S.A. § 8542. Recently in In re Tax Claim Unit of Northampton County, 522 Pa. 230 , 560 A.2d 1388 (1989) this court determined that the defense of governmental immunity was a defense incapable of waiver. Here, although the claim arguably fell within one of the exceptions to that immunity, 42 Pa.C.S.A. § 8542(b)(3), the above referred to statement is in sharp contravention to our prior assessment of the law in that area. Secondly, a plain reading of the Recreational Use Act does not support the majority’s interpretation that the act was intended only to apply to owners of unimproved realty. In fact in the definition of land, as contained in the act, the term “land” was stated to include: roads; water; watercourses; private ways and buildings; structures and machinery or equipment when attached to the realty. 68 P.S. § 477-2(1). Clearly the inclusion of these items belies the majority’s conclusion that only owners of unimproved realty are protected. To so hold is to ignore the spirit of the legislature which in enacting the statute “balanced danger against a benefit to a great number of people; allowing a use of facilities with immunity from liability, great and *246 small, so that many could have what the possible consequences for an injury to one, would make improvident to give to any.” Rivera v. Philadelphia Theological Seminary, 510 Pa. 1, 34 , 507 A.2d 1, 18 (1986). See also Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Resources v. Auresto, 511 Pa. 73 , 511 A.2d 815 (1986), Hahn v. United States, 493 F.Supp. 57 (D.C.Pa.1980) and Watson v. City of Omaha, 209 Neb. 835 , 312 N.W.2d 256 (1981).
Accordingly, I dissent and join the dissent of Mr. Chief Justice NIX.