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By erecting unsafe roadworks and an inadequately marked footpath barricade on Zillmere Road at Aspley, Brisbane City Council breached its duty to take reasonable care for road users.
That finding arose out of an injury claim by 64-yr-old cyclist Victor Dennison whose bike collided with the barricade.
But for reasons that will be explained, the council escaped all responsibility for the accident and Victor’s injuries.
The recently retired industrial chemist left his Zillmere home at about 4.00 am on 18 December 2009 for one of his regular rides west along the concrete footpath beside Zillmere Road.
The council had been carrying out cathodic protection works on an underground water main. After excavating and re-concreting part of the footpath, workers erected an orange mesh barricade supported by yellow metal stakes to protect the concrete overnight. The barricade was about one metre high and tied at its inner ends to a black perimeter fence.
The arrangement left some space on the roadside of the footpath, but there was no sign directing path users around the obstruction. The orange mesh and yellow stakes were not reflective or fluorescent. The stakes were uncapped. Although four reflective witches hats had initially been placed around the barricade, they had been removed or stolen before the collision.
The area around the barricade was dark given the nearest streetlight was not working and surrounding lights provided little useful illumination.
No one saw the collision and Victor had no memory of it.
By the time his injury compensation claim came before the Supreme Court in Brisbane, Victor was 80 and living with dementia.
Justice Lynton Crowley reconstructed what most probably happened from the scene evidence, photographs, blood trails and expert opinion. Victor had been travelling at least about 15 kph. He did not appreciate the full extent of the barricade until it was too late, veered towards the fence-side grass strip and collided with the mesh that extended across that area. He was thrown from the bicycle and impaled his left eye on one of the stakes that penetrated his eye socket and cranial cavity, causing the loss of the eye, fractures and a traumatic brain injury.
The council accepted a duty to take reasonable care, but argued its precautions were sufficient, the barricade was an obvious risk and Mr Dennison failed to keep a proper lookout.
The court rejected those arguments: in the conditions confronting an approaching cyclist, the barricade’s presence and extent could not be appreciated until it was too late to avoid it. Applying the usual negligence principles the judge found that the risk of a cyclist colliding with the barricade was foreseeable and not insignificant.
The council had not checked the lighting, installed additional lighting or a retroreflective warning sign, provided effective alternative-path guidance, or secured the witches hats. A reasonable response required the Council to make the barricade visible at night, warn path users, delineate its position and extent, and guide cyclists safely around it.
The council – somewhat belatedly – introduced a further defence based on Civil Liability Act s 36(2). Under that section – because the claimant was a “public authority”, he was required to establish that the council’s conduct was so unreasonable that no similar local council would properly have considered the (defective) barricade set-up to have been a reasonable means of protecting road users. The absence of a proper risk assessment, warning signs, alternative-path delineation or retroreflective devices did not, by themselves, prove that requirement.
With no further evidence at his disposal, Victor therefore fell short by not being able to show the BCC’s method fell outside the range of measures other responsible local councils might properly implement to guard the worksite.
His claim was dismissed.
As a precautionary measure – i.e. in case of a successful appeal – Justice Crowley assessed damages at $676,000, including $108,000 for general damages and $482,000 for past gratuitous care. No appeal has however been lodged.
Notwithstanding his loss at trial, the cyclist was only ordered to pay a portion of the council’s legal costs.
Dennison v Brisbane City Council [2026] QSC 83 Crowley J, 1 May 2026
Categories: Cyclist accident