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# City Hall settles lawsuit over handicap ramp accident
- URL: https://www.smdp.com/city-hall-settles-lawsuit-over-handicap-ramp-accident/
- Published: 2003-11-19T16:00:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-23T03:15:10.000Z
- Author: John Wood
- Tags: Government & Politics, Santa Monica, #archive-import

*Wilshire ramp still unchanged*

City officials have agreed to pay $26,000 to a woman who broke her ankle when she slipped on a handicap ramp in December of 2001.

Carol Day, 56, who works in Santa Monica Canyon, originally demanded $150,000 to settle the lawsuit, which claimed City Hall and the adjacent property owner should have known the ramp was dangerous because it was covered in slippery decorative stones. Day slipped on the ramp after eating lunch at P.F. Chang’s. The ramp is located across the street from the restaurant, on the northeast corner of Wilshire Boulevard.

Both City Hall and Douglas Emmett & Co., the owner of the building at 401 Wilshire Blvd., have agreed to settle the case. Day’s husband of 30-plus years, local architect Carl Day, said the two settlement amounts are about the same. City Hall’s $26,000 settlement was approved by the City Council last week.

City Hall lawyers said it would be difficult to prove that the ramp was dangerous, but it was safer to settle it than to let the case go before jurors.

Pedestrians walking by the handicap ramp on Tuesday said they didn’t think the ramp was problematic.

“It seems like it’s the same as all the other ones,” said Santa Monica resident Charlotta Weir, who was on an afternoon walk, pushing daughters Bella and Mia in a stroller.

Carol Day, who lives in Agoura Hills, couldn’t be reached for comment. Carl Day said his wife can no longer go for long walks and has had difficulty exercising because of the accident. He added that she’s glad to finally be putting the legal dispute behind her.

“The city at first, instead of really investigating — they had somebody drive by and look at the intersection and kind of kissed it off, which was more than upsetting to us,” he said, adding the ramp still hasn’t been fixed.

Not only do the coated stones make the ramp slippery, but the slope of the ramp is too steep and therefore dangerous, Carol Day argued in the lawsuit.

Carl Day said the day of the accident was still fresh in his memory.

“She went down, and I grabbed her, and that was that,” he said. “She was lying there with the ankle bone protruding through the side of her leg — the bone didn’t pierce the skin, it was just bulging out on the side of it.”

Carl Day

![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/55/9f/559f9abc-8372-4a2e-8c2d-27386da4e363/content/images/2026/10/111903-02_01-7.jpg)

People use the ramp at Fourth Street and Wilshire Boulevard, which was at the center of a legal dispute between City Hall and a woman who settled for $26,000\. (Photo: John Wood/Daily Press)

*Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on November 19, 2003.* [Read the original PDF.](https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/smdp%5Fbackissues/111903.pdf?ref=smdp.com)