delivered the opinion of the court.
The plaintiff was injured in an automobile collision which occurred on October 24, 1958, at the intersection of Tampa and Talala Streets in the Village of Park Forest, Illinois. He was a рassenger in an automobile driven by the defendant, Donald Michaels, eastbound on Tampa. The other automobile was being driven by the defendant, Robert Parker, southbound on Talalа. The plaintiff’s complaint charged Michaels with willful and wanton misconduct and charged Parker and the Village of Park Forest with negligence. The court granted the Village’s motion for summаry judgment, from which judgment the plaintiff prosecutes the present appeal, the court having found that there was no just reason for delaying the appeal.
The gist of the complaint against the Village is its failure to provide two-way stop signs on Tampa Street at the intersection with Talala. The Village trustees had approved the installation of the signs in а resolution passed at their meeting on August 26, 1958, because “there is heavy traffic at this corner,” and had instructed the Village Manager to proceed with the installation, but at the time of the accident the stop signs had not yet been put up. The plaintiff contends that once the municipality passed the resolution or ordinance directing the installation of stоp signs, it then assumed an obligation to act with reasonable diligence to complete its undertaking, and that the failure to do so constituted negligence in the performance of a ministerial duty. The position of the Village is that it was exercising a governmental function when it authorized the erection of the stop signs and that it was not subject to liability until it began to carry out the ministerial function of putting up the signs and maintaining them.
It has been uniformly held that municipal corporations are not subject to liability for governmental functions but are liable fоr torts arising from ministerial or proprietary functions. Ludwig v. Board of Education, 35 Ill App2d 401,
There have been numerous cases in Illinois involving the liability of municipal corporations for injuries resulting from the development, maintenance and improvement of streets, sidewalks, bridges and sewers. A municipality is responsible for the negligent construction of public works and for its failure to maintain them, but it is not obligated, and is not liable for its neglect or refusal, tо undertake such projects. The difficulty involved in subjecting a city, town or village to such an obligation, for example keeping sidewalks well lighted, was pointed out in City of Freeport v. Isbell, 83 Ill 440 (1876):
“It might be a matter of great convenience to have all our cities or incorporated towns well lighted, in the nighttime, with gas, and it might add to the security of pedestrians whose business or tastes might require them to travel at late hours of the night; but to hold that a city or incorporated town was under a legal obligation to thus provide the streets with light, might well be regarded as an аct of usurpation, on the part of the courts, of the legislative power, which has been exclusively delegated to the legislative department of the municipality.”
There аre several decisions which delineate the extent of a city’s liability. In Buckley v. City of Chicago, 3 Ill App2d 39,
“In the present case the ordinance creating a through street and providing for stop signs at each intersection was designed to protect travelers on intersecting and through streets from the danger of collision. In our view it was rеadily foreseeable that such a collision might happen because of the City’s failure to maintain these stop signs on Throop Street.”
The City of East Moline was held liable for the negligent maintenance of a stop light, which became defective and caused a collision between two automobiles traveling through the intersection. Johnston v. City of East Mоline, 405 Ill 460,
“A municipal corporation acts judicially or exercises discretion when it selects and adopts a plan in the making of public improvements, but as soon as it begins to carry out that plan it acts ministerially and is bound to see that the wоrk is done in a reasonably safe and skillful manner.”
In the Buckley and Johnston cases, the municipalities were found liable for negligently maintaining traffic regulators; in the present case the Village of Park Forest had done nothing except authorize the placement of stop signs. As far as the plaintiff and all other motorists using the streets in the Village of Park Forest werе concerned, there had been no change in the regulation of traffic at the corner of Tampa and Talala; no motorist could have relied upon the protеction that would have been afforded by the signs.
In Locigno v. City of Chicago, 32 Ill App2d 412,
“Should the case be considered from the standpoint of regulation оf traffic, the City would not be liable. As a general rule, public liability for an injury resulting from tbe use of a street or other public way in such mode or manner as to endanger the safety of travelers, but which does not render the way physically defective, cannot be predicated upon the failure of the public authorities, by the enactment of ordinances or otherwise, to prevent such use . . . Johnston v. City of East Moline, 405 Ill 460,91 NE2d 401 , and City of Chicago v. Seben, 165 Ill 371,46 NE 244 , indicate that until the City acts it cannot be held liable. In the case at bar the City was under no obligation to post signs at the intersection. The Johnston case involved traffic-control lights that were in operation at the time of the accident.”
Liability follows negligence. The Village of Park Forest certainly would not be liable for not passing an ordinance providing for traffic signs on Tampa Street at the intersection with Talala, on the ground that it thereby failed to regulate the flow of traffic and failed to protect motorists from the dangers inherent in driving an automobile at that corner. It follows that the Village was not negligent and could not be liable for not installing the signs аfter the ordinance was passed. The legal obligation and the ministerial function of the Village did not commence until the signs were erected. From that time on it had a duty to properly maintain the signs so that those motorists or pedestrians who would come to depend upon them for protection would not be endangered either by their absence or their nonoperation.
The summary judgment granted by the trial court is affirmed.
Affirmed.