Pedestrian Accident Rights in St. Paul: Crosswalks and Beyond

If a car hit you while you were walking, you generally have the right to pursue the driver's liability insurance for medical bills, lost income, and pain — and you do not lose that right just because you were not in a painted crosswalk. That last part surprises people constantly, and it is the reason a lot of valid claims never get made.

Pedestrian cases involve the worst injury-to-fault-dispute ratio in this whole area of law. The person on foot absorbs everything, and then gets asked whether they were paying attention.

The crosswalk rule people get wrong

Most state vehicle codes recognize two kinds of crosswalk:

• Marked crosswalks — the painted ones.
• Unmarked crosswalks — the invisible extension of the sidewalk line across the roadway at an intersection. In most states, this is legally a crosswalk whether or not anyone painted it.

So "there was no crosswalk" is often not the defense the driver's insurer thinks it is. At an intersection, there frequently was one.

Outside of crosswalks, drivers still owe a duty to keep a proper lookout and to exercise due care to avoid a pedestrian they can see. A person crossing mid-block may share fault. A driver who never looked up from a phone shares plenty.

Comparative fault, in plain terms

Almost every state now uses some version of comparative fault. Your recovery is reduced by your percentage of responsibility. Under pure comparative fault, you can recover even at 80 percent at fault, reduced accordingly. Under modified comparative fault, you recover nothing once you cross 50 or 51 percent, depending on the state.

What that means practically: the insurer's opening move is almost always to assign you a big share. Dark clothing, mid-block crossing, looking at a phone, a "don't walk" signal. Some of that may be true. The percentage is negotiable, and it is negotiated with evidence.

What decides the fault split

Sightlines and lighting. Could the driver see you? Photographs at the same time of day matter here, because a scene at 2 p.m. looks nothing like the scene at the time of impact.

Point of impact and resting positions. Where you were struck within the roadway is often reconstructable, and it tells a story about who was where.

Speed. Skid marks, damage severity, and how far you were thrown all speak to it.

The driver's attention. Phone records, a statement to police, whether they braked at all.

Signals. Signal timing at a controlled intersection can often be pulled from the municipality.

Video. This is the big one. Traffic cameras, transit buses, doorbell cameras, and business surveillance frequently capture pedestrian collisions. Most of those systems overwrite themselves automatically, sometimes within days. Somebody has to ask for it early.

The deadline that ends good cases

If a government vehicle or a government entity is involved — a city bus, a municipal truck, a claim about a dangerously designed intersection or a missing signal — most jurisdictions require a written notice of claim to the public entity on a much shorter clock than an ordinary lawsuit. Months, not years, in many places.

Miss it and the case is generally over regardless of how badly you were hurt or how clearly someone else was wrong. If any part of your incident involves a public agency, that is the reason to make a phone call this week rather than next season.

Hit and run: check your own auto policy

A striking number of people never make a claim after a hit-and-run because they assume that with no driver to sue, there is nothing to pursue.

The uninsured motorist coverage on your own auto policy commonly covers you as a pedestrian struck by an unidentified or uninsured driver. Coverage under a resident family member's policy may also apply. You do not have to have been in your car. You have to have the coverage.

Also check for medical payments coverage, which pays regardless of fault and pays quickly.

Report the hit-and-run to police immediately either way. UM claims involving an unidentified driver generally require a prompt police report, and an insurer will look hard at a report filed three days later.

What to do, in order

1. Call 911 and accept transport if it is offered. Declining the ambulance to save money is the most expensive decision people make on these scenes.
2. Get the police report number and the responding officer's name.
3. Photograph everything — or ask someone to. The vehicle, its position, the intersection, the signals, the lighting, the crosswalk markings or their absence, your injuries.
4. Get witness names and numbers. Pedestrian collisions have witnesses more often than car crashes, and they scatter.
5. Note nearby cameras. Businesses, transit stops, doorbells, ATMs. Write down the addresses. This list is the most useful thing you can hand an attorney in week one.
6. See a doctor the same day. Head and internal injuries commonly present hours later.
7. Keep the clothing and shoes you were wearing, unwashed.
8. Do not give a recorded statement to the driver's insurer before you understand your own injuries.

The cases that do not need an attorney

Saying so costs us a phone call and saves you an afternoon.

If you were clipped, shaken up, and genuinely not injured, there is nothing to claim. No injury, no case.

If you had one clinic visit and were fine within days, submitting the bills directly to the driver's insurer is a reasonable path. Know your total bills and lost wages first, and know that signing the release closes it forever.

Get a free case review if you were hospitalized or transported, you have a fracture, head injury, or ongoing symptoms, the driver fled, fault is being disputed, or any government entity is involved. That last one because of the notice deadline, and it applies even if your injuries seem moderate right now.

St. Paul Personal Injury Lawyers does not practice law. It is a referral service, and for someone struck on foot anywhere in St. Paul or the Twin Cities it arranges a no-charge read of the file by a pedestrian accident attorney — someone who can tell you whether the fault split qualifies your claim as worth bringing, and whether one of the notice clocks above is already running against it. Nothing is owed for that conversation. If the injury happened on private property rather than in the roadway, our premises liability page is the right starting point, and the insurance mechanics sit in our crash checklist.

Call (833) 968-5178 or use the form on this site. This article is information, not legal advice.