Articles Posted in Pedestrian Accidents

Stream_Pedestrian_safety-300x225In San Marcos, a fatal accident occurred early Thursday morning when a 59-year-old man was struck by a pickup truck while crossing East Mission Road at Mulberry Drive, near Hollandia Dairy and Mission Hills High School. The incident, reported around 4:30 a.m., involved the pedestrian being hit by an eastbound traveling Dodge Ram while the pedestrian was in a crosswalk.

The driver of the Dodge Ram, a 61-year-old man, stopped immediately after the accident and called 911. Despite paramedics’ efforts to save the pedestrian’s life, he succumbed to his injuries at the scene. The eastbound lanes of East Mission Road near the high school were closed for investigation.

While the cause of the accident is still being determined, pedestrian-vehicle accidents are commonly caused by the negligence of the involved driver. When this happens, catastrophic injuries may result. Some common forms of driver negligence that increase the risks of such accidents include:

Now that school has started, and children in and around Poway are walking to bus stops and through neighborhoods, it is important for parents and caregivers to think about the risks of child pedestrian injuries and to take precautions. Children are often at particular risk of severe and deadly pedestrian accident injuries, but most of these accidents are avoidable. Our Poway personal injury lawyers can provide you with more information about child pedestrian injuries and how to file a claim in the event of an accident. 

Getting the Facts About Child Pedestrian Injuries

Children are at a higher risk of incurring pedestrian accident injuries than people of other ages. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), more than 20% of kids under the age of 15 who were killed in motor vehicle collisions were pedestrians at the time of the crash. Safe Kids Worldwide reports that more than 15,000 nonfatal child pedestrian injuries occur every year, and more than 350 children are killed in pedestrian collisions. The majority of the kids who are seriously or fatally injured in pedestrian accidents are between the ages of 12 and 19, and a majority of the accidents occur at non-intersections.  

If you are regularly on the road in Oceanside or elsewhere in San Diego County, it is critical to be aware of the risks of distracted driving. Not only should you be taking precautions yourself to avoid getting distracted behind the wheel of your own car, but you should also be aware of the significant likelihood that another motorist on the road is engaged in distracted driving at any given moment. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) emphasizes that distracted driving collisions have increased significantly as more car and truck drivers have begun using smartphones, and more crashes have resulted from talking or texting while driving. 

A new study published in The Journal of Bone & Joint Surgery suggests that the distracted driving problem may be even bigger than previously suspected. Indeed, the authors of the study reported that more than 99 percent of motorists who have been involved in collisions admit to driving while distracted at least once in the last 12 months. 

Details of the Recent Distracted Driving Study

Just because the coronavirus pandemic has shifted much thinking about safety in Southern California to issues of virus containment does not mean pedestrian safety and car accident prevention should lose consideration. Putting the two public health issues together—COVID-19 prevention and pedestrian safety—some cities in California have started to install touch-free crosswalk signals to ensure that pedestrians and bicyclists do not avoid using traffic safety signals in order to avoid risk of exposure to the coronavirus.

 
It is important for pedestrians and bicyclists to understand ways of staying safe and avoiding motor vehicle collisions, and it is also critical to understand how comparative fault can reduce a pedestrian or bicyclist’s damages award if they do not abide by traffic rules.

 
How Touch-Free Pedestrian and Bicyclist Signals can Help to Prevent Intersection Accidents

nathan-dumlao-1064615-unsplash-copy-200x300Whether you live in San Marcos or elsewhere in the San Diego County area, it is important to know about electric scooters and the personal injury risks they pose. According to a recent news release from the University of California, new research suggests that e-scooters are tied to high rates of traumatic brain injury (TBI), broken bones, and dislocated joints. Those who sustain these types of injuries on e-scooters require medical attention, and some seemingly less serious injuries also require riders to seek treatment in an emergency department.

Why are e-scooters dangerous, and how should residents around San Diego County respond?

New Study Ties Electric Scooters to Serious Personal Injuries

bethany-legg-14229-copy-300x200Intersections located in Escondido, Chula Vista, and Hillcrest are among the most dangerous places for a pedestrian to cross the street in the San Diego area, according to a recent report from CBS 8 News. The report discusses a new study that “is shedding light on pedestrian safety across San Diego County” and identifying areas where pedestrian accidents occur most often. That study explored accident reports going back to 2011 involving pedestrian injuries and fatalities. There are numerous reasons that motor vehicle drivers at these intersections crash into pedestrians, from issues of blind spots to sheer distracted driving. In some cases, pedestrians have been struck in hit-and-run accidents.

Which intersections and other pedestrian areas of San Diego should you recognize in terms of safety risks?

Why do Pedestrian Accidents Happen at Particular Intersections?

bethany-legg-14229-copy-300x200Many Valley Center residents have heard about the risks of distracted driving. Indeed, as a report from ABC News 10 discusses, on January 1, 2017 additional cell phone laws took effect that prevent California drivers from holding a phone or doing anything more than making a single tap or a single swipe. While drivers are still permitted to use cell phones as GPS devices, provided that they are mounted somewhere in the vehicle, the change to the law aims to prevent distracted driving accidents. What about distracted walking? While the term might sound like an odd one, it is becoming a relatively serious problem in California and throughout major urban areas in the country.

According to a recent report from KEYT News 3, a local official is proposing a change to the law. In short, in order to improve public safety, San Mateo County Supervisor David Canepa is hoping to institute a distracted walking law that “would make it illegal to use the crosswalk while using your cell phone.” Is such a law likely to pass? Is it necessary to prevent pedestrian accidents?

Pedestrian Accidents on the Rise Due to Smartphone Use

michael-mroczek-199379-copy-300x200For parents and their neighbors in Rancho Bernardo, it is important to understand important school bus safety laws as kids throughout California return to school. We can all take steps to prevent bus accidents. However, according to a recent report from CBS News, many drivers do not always obey school bus safety laws simply because they do not know them. Now is the time to learn because the California Highway Patrol (CHP) plans to conduct pedestrian safety enforcement operations along the California coast in the coming school days.

What are School Bus Laws in California?

In short, it is important for motorists to know how to behave around a school bus (and how to obey the law). In particular, if you are driving behind a school bus that is picking up or dropping off children, or if you are approaching such a bus from the opposite direction, what does the law require you to do? The report emphasizes the importance of understanding and abiding by the following laws to prevent child pedestrian accidents and fatalities:

nabeel-syed-2856-copy-300x200Pedestrian accidents happen a lot more frequently than they should in Encinitas, according to a recent article in The San Diego Union-Tribune. The city recognizes the particular risks for pedestrians who walk along El Camino Real, and the city is taking steps to try to make this stretch safer for anyone who is on foot. The city recently hired an expert to conduct a “walking audit” of El Camino Real with a group of participants and to make recommendations for preventing a pedestrian accident and improving safety in general for pedestrians in the area.

What can the city do to make Encinitas a more pedestrian-friendly place?

The “Walking Audit” and its Outcome

david-cohen-249124-copy-300x160Could a multi-vehicle accident caused by road rage and aggressive driving happen in Vista, California? According to a recent report from ABC News, a motorcyclist’s road rage and aggressive driving caused a serious crash around Santa Clarita. The collision involved a sedan and a pickup truck, and that pickup truck overturned as a result of the crash. The motorcyclist—who was caught on film by other drivers, fled the scene of the car accident. The incident should alerts drivers throughout Southern California to the serious risks associated with road rage and other forms of aggressive driving.

Details of the Road Rage Accident

According to report, the accident happened at approximately 5:45 a.m. on a recent weekday morning. While witnesses could not say precisely what started the altercation, those heading southbound on State Road 14 managed to film a motorcyclist who “appears to try to kick the sedan” the approaches on his right. As a result of the motorcyclist’s behavior, the “sedan veers to the left and briefly collides with the motorcyclist before losing control and crashing into the highway divider wall.”

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