Lately, it seems like there’s an epidemic of car accidents in New York involving pedestrians.
For example, back in May, a car jumped the curb and the driver intentionally ran down around 23 people.
Then, in June, an SUV decided to rush a yellow light and ended up on the sidewalk instead of the road, putting one woman in the hospital and bloodying and bruising another 10.
There are plenty of good reasons to be worried about your safety on city streets if you’re a pedestrian:
- Distracted drivers who are more interested in their cellphone conversations than they are in the congested traffic around them
- Delivery drivers who are rushing to get from one delivery point to the next within a specific time frame so that they don’t anger either a boss or a client
- Crowded sidewalks that sometimes don’t have enough room for everyone to pass, especially during lunch hours—forcing some people to step off the curb where they’re even more at risk
- Drivers who are generally hostile to pedestrians in the first place because they see them as crowding the road and causing unnecessary slow-downs when they cross the streets
- Poorly-designed street layouts that aren’t designed with walkers in mind in the first place
- Parking spaces that create blind spots for drivers, which can cause them to back up into a pedestrian very easily as they try to pull back out of their space
- Drivers who get impatient behind mass transit buses—which leads them to swerve around the buses and sometimes directly into a pedestrian they couldn’t see
There’s no contest when a pedestrian faces off with a car—even a light tap from an auto can knock someone down and cause bruises, broken bones, fractured hips, head injuries and more. It doesn’t help that there’s generally no place for a pedestrian to fall except on concrete or asphalt—neither of which are forgiving to the human body.
Any pedestrian that’s injured by a car should seek legal help immediately. It’s important to protect your right to compensation as you recover from your injuries. For more information about how our firm can help you if you’ve been injured by a negligent driver, please visit our wepages on the subject.
