Question: Do business owners have a duty to shovel PUBLIC sidewalks?
Answer: No, however see below.
In order to establish negligence, plaintiffs must show that defendant owed a duty. Absent a duty, there can be no breach and, therefore, no recovery in a negligence cause of action. The existence of duty is a question for the court. In Indiana, an owner or occupant of property abutting a public street or sidewalk has no duty to clear those streets and sidewalks of ice and snow. Additionally, municipal ordinances that require abutting owners or occupiers to remove snow and ice from public sidewalks do not create a duty under which they can be held liable to third parties. Persons are held to have assumed a duty to people on public sidewalks and street when they create artificial conditions that increase risk and proximately cause injury to the plaintiff. Thus, defendants can be held liable by creating a more dangerous condition if injuries are directly attributable to that condition. However, the removal of the natural accumulation of snow and ice from a public sidewalk has never been held to be an artificially created condition that increases risk so as to serve as the basis of liability in Indiana.
