Day on Torts
Dismissal based on the Recreational Use Statute was affirmed where the plaintiff tripped on an uneven sidewalk while camping at a state park.
In Thompson v. State of Tennessee, No. M2025-00518-COA-R3-CV (Tenn. Ct. App. Mar. 25, 2026), the plaintiff went to a state park to camp for the weekend. While walking on a sidewalk to the bathroom, the plaintiff tripped. The sidewalk was later determined to be uneven with the road at an intersection. According to a park ranger, the area had previously been painted yellow but the paint had faded.
The plaintiff filed this premises liability case with the Claims Commission, and the state filed a motion to dismiss based on the Tennessee Recreational Use Statute (TRUS). The Claims Commission found that the TRUS applied and granted dismissal, and the Court of Appeals affirmed.
The TRUS, Tenn. Code Ann. § 70-7-101 et seq., “provides an affirmative defense to a landowner, including the State of Tennessee, when a visitor is injured during recreational use of the property.” (internal citation omitted). Asserting the TRUS as an affirmative defense requires a three-part analysis: (1) determining whether the defendant was a landowner, (2), determining “whether the activity in which the injured party was engaged in at the time of the injury is a recreational activity,” and (3) determining whether any of the statutory exceptions apply. In this case, the contested issue was step two, whether the plaintiff was engaged in a recreational activity when she was injured.
While camping is clearly a recreational activity included in the TRUS, the plaintiff argued that because she was walking on a sidewalk to the bathroom at the time of her injury, she was not engaged in a recreational activity. The Court quickly rejected this argument. The Court explained that the TRUS “applies the moment a visitor enters the property for a recreational purpose, even if the visitor has not yet begun the recreational activity.” (internal citation omitted). The Court concluded:
Here, Plaintiff’s complaint affirmatively states that she was in the Park for the purpose of camping, and it is undisputed that she paid for a campsite at the Park to stay from Friday June 23, 3032 to Sunday, June 25, 2023. We also note that camping is a recreational activity listed in Tennessee Code Annotated § 70-7-102. Thus, the TRUS applied as soon as Plaintiff entered the Park for the purpose of camping.
The Court therefore agreed that the TRUS applied at the time the plaintiff fell.
The plaintiff alternatively argued that the TRUS did not apply “because a sidewalk is an improvement and the TRUS does not apply to improvements to the land or premises.” Looking to the definitions in the statute, the Court disagreed that improvements were not encompassed in the broad definitions included in the TRUS. The Court wrote that “[b]ecause a sidewalk is more or less permanently added to the land, the sidewalk at issue here falls under the umbrella of real property.” (internal quotations omitted). Moreover, the Court pointed out that it had “repeatedly held that the TRUS applies to man-made improvements.”
The Court noted in its conclusion that the plaintiff also made a public policy argument “claiming the applicability of the TRUS is too broad,” but the Court stated that its role was to interpret the law, “not to address the prudence of a public policy decision.”
Because the plaintiff entered the park for the recreational purpose of camping, the TRUS applied and dismissal of the premises liability suit was affirmed.
This opinion was released 3.5 months after oral arguments in this case.