A lawsuit filed against the city of Burlington over an accident on the sewer trail in Dankwardt Park in 2015 has been reversed and remanded for trial in a unanimous decision by the Iowa Supreme Court.

Kathryn Marie Breese, 57, and her then 9-year-old daughter, identified in court records as E.K.B., were riding bicycles on the trail on Aug. 30, 2015, when they encountered an area where the dropoff was about 10 feet and tree branches were blocking the path. Breese helped her daughter turn her bike around to return the other direction, but when Breese attempted to turn her bike around, a tree branch caught her and she and her bicycle fell off the trail, with Breese suffering serious injuries.

Her daughter had to seek help and EMTs transported Breese to Great River Medical Center for treatment of her injuries.

Breese filed suit against the city on Aug. 29, 2017, alleging negligent conduct in connecting the pathway in Dankwardt Park to the sewer box without providing guardrails, in failing to provide warning signs that the pathway reached dangerous heights without a safe turnaround point and failing to provide signs that the sewer box was not part of the trail system, in effect implying the sewer box was a part of the trail system.

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The sewer box trail remains in use by the public. Many people walk or bike the trail daily. The city has put up a warning sign at each end that says, “CAUTION: Not a trail or sidewalk. No guardrail. Please stay off.” The sign is in the center of the sewer box, but is easily skirted to gain access to the sewer box. There are no gates installed, and there remains an access at ground level from a small trail near the Shoququon Tennis Club in a valley on the north side of Dankwardt Park.

In an email, Ferneau said “...the box sewer was not designed as, nor was it intended to be, a trail. This is why it did not have a railing or other safety measures installed. However, the injury in this case highlighted the fact some citizens apparently treated it like a trail. This injury made it apparent that signage prohibiting its use as a trail needed to be erected at both ends so that no one uses it as a trail in the future.”