Section 240 of the New York Labor Law was enacted over a hundred years ago in response to the Legislature’s concern over unsafe conditions that beset employees who worked at height-related worksites. The Law obligates property owners and general contractors to protect workers engaged in the “erection, demolition, repairing, altering, painting, cleaning or pointing of a building or structure.” See N.Y. Lab. Law §240 (McKinney 1986).

Although Labor Law 240(1) covers work that is performed on a “building” or “structure,” neither “building” nor “structure” is defined. In keeping with the statute’s intent, courts have interpreted the word “structure” liberally to include much more than buildings or houses. For example, the Court of Appeals in Caddy v. Interborough Rapid Transit Co., 195 N.Y. 415, 420, 88 N.E. 747 (1909) held that a “structure” is “any production or piece of work artificially built up or composed of parts joined together in some definite manner.” A hundred years later, the Court of Appeals is still applying this same definition. See Lewis-Moors v. Contel of New York, 78 N.Y.2d 942, 943 (1991).