Order unanimously affirmed with costs. Memorandum: Plaintiff was injured when the car in which he was riding left a county highway and struck a bridge retaining wall. Supreme Court properly denied the portion of defendant's motion for summary judgment seeking dismissal of plaintiff's cause of action for negligent maintenance of the wall. On this record, there is a triable issue of fact whether the County's maintenance of the wall was a substantial factor in aggravating plaintiff's injuries (see, Gutelle v City of New York, 55 N.Y.2d 794, 796; Kirisits v State of New York, 107 A.D.2d 156, 158; Pontello v County of Onondaga, 94 A.D.2d 427, 431-432, lv dismissed 60 N.Y.2d 1015). We note only that summary judgment is rarely granted in negligence cases (Andre v Pomeroy, 35 N.Y.2d 361, 364-365) and that proximate cause is almost always a triable issue of fact (Derdiarian v Felix Contr. Corp., 51 N.Y.2d 308, 314-315).