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With offices coming back to life as the COVID-19 pandemic recedes, one area of focus should be your commute. Choosing to travel to and from the office via bicycle has become increasingly popular. It’s a practice celebrated by National Bike to Work Day, which is coming up soon on May 17.

Just how many people commute this way may surprise you. Numbers published by the U.S. Census show that nearly 900,000 Americans are commuting using bikes, or about 0.6% of the total working population. The practice of bike commuting is especially popular with younger workers in larger cities. Workers 24 and younger commute at rates almost double the national average.

The first priority of a good commute is staying safe — and that applies double for those who travel via bicycle, given their added exposure to the elements and sometimes-careless motorists.

With that in mind, let’s review some commuting tips for cyclists.

Five Best Practices for a Safe Commute to the Office

• Wear appropriate safety gear A helmet is non-negotiable, as it is the single most impactful thing you can wear to protect yourself. While some people may fret about a helmet affecting their hair before arriving at work, keeping your brain healthy is of paramount importance. Headlights and taillights help ensure that you maintain visibility if you have early morning or late evening commutes.

• Practice smart situational awareness A cyclist should never assume that motorists can see them or will stop when they should. When you enter intersections or other high-risk areas, proceed cautiously and with focused intention. It’s also important to remain hyper-aware of your surroundings.

• Avoid the most common hazards within city commuting routes For example, the possibility of having a driver or passenger open a door in front of you while in a parked car is one of the most common, and dangerous, accident scenarios a commuter faces. Understanding these situations can help you avoid them and plan your route accordingly.

• Give yourself plenty of time to make your commute Rushing is one of the easiest ways to get distracted and lose your focus, so ensure your commute is comfortably timed.

• Plot out your route in advance for maximum safety and efficiency A predictable commuting route that avoids high-risk areas and takes advantage of the biking infrastructure can help ensure that you arrive at work on time and in good shape.

By following these fundamental rules, you can enjoy all the great benefits of cycling to work (sustainability, fitness, cost savings etc.) while ensuring that you remain healthy.

Finding the Right Bicycle Accident Attorney

Gary Brustin is a lifelong cyclist and a specialist in bicycle accident law. In fact, these are the only types of cases he accepts. If you’ve been injured in a collision, we urge you to contact Gary for a complimentary consultation.

Creating a post-crash checklist can help ensure that you stay safe and receive the compensation you deserve for the losses or injuries you have sustained.

With that in mind, let’s review the steps you should take if you find yourself in this situation.

A Post Crash Checklist for Cyclists

• Immediately after the crash, check yourself for injuries. This includes common bike fall injuries such as cuts, scrapes, broken bones etc.
• Render first aid to yourself or others if needed. Evaluate yourself for a concussion (check and see if your helmet is cracked or damaged).
• If the accident is significant, contact first responders.
• Ask the other party for information or write down the vehicle’s license plate number.
• If witnesses are present, ask them for contact information. Their neutral testimony could help you establish the other party’s fault if a settlement or court case follows.
• Take photos or videos of the crash scene. This can also help establish liability and help you prevail in a court case.
• Ask police to make an incident report.
• If you are in pain or feel you may have internal injuries, seek a medical evaluation at once.
• In the days or weeks that follow, request the incident report from police.
• Track any medical expenses you accrue, or any lost wages from time off work, or any added costs (such as transport) that you have dealt with as a result of the accident.
• Contact an experienced California bicycle accident attorney.
• A California bicycle accident law firm can help ensure that insurers will not take advantage of you. Insurance companies employ skilled negotiators who will seek to minimize any compensation regardless of your level of injury or loss. Working with an experienced California bicycle accident lawyer can level the playing field.
• Ask your attorney any questions you have. This may include inquiring about their experience level or their process for communicating with clients.
• California bicycle accident lawyers can also help you understand how the legal process works, how liability is established and how any compensation you receive may be calculated.
• By asking these questions, you can ensure that your attorney is a specialist in bicycle accident law and set your mind at ease. Understanding how to deal with insurance companies or when to take a settlement can be difficult tasks for someone without legal training. The right law firm can make this process as painless as possible.

The Next Steps for You to Take

By following this checklist, you can help ensure that you recover from your injuries quickly, and that your legal rights in the wake of the accident are protected.

It’s important, however, to pay close attention to experience when considering working with a bicycle accident lawyer in California. These cases can be complex when it comes to establishing liability, so it is critical to work with a legal partner with a track record within this field of litigation.

Finding the Right Bicycle Accident Attorney

Gary Brustin is a lifelong cyclist and a specialist in bicycle accident law. In fact, these are the only types of cases he accepts. If you’ve been injured in a collision, we urge you to contact Gary for a complimentary consultation.

Do cyclists suffer from excessive fixation on helmet safety?

With accidental deaths at historic highs in the United States, it’s a good time for cyclists to consider how to best protect themselves. As part of this process, we should be willing to rethink what we believe about safety, and poke holes in conventional wisdom, if that “wisdom” is making us less safe.

Bicycle helmets are one great example. Ask someone how to best protect herself on a bike, and “a good helmet” is likely to be answer number one.

And that makes sense – our brains are the most vulnerable, and irreplaceable, parts of our anatomy.

Yet as a recent Bicycle.com piece argues, it’s possible to place too much emphasis on a single safety intervention. While helmets are great, in many cases, they are the equivalent of trying to treat a severed limb with a band-aid.

According to Biycle.com:

“The truth is that helmets help, but only to a point. If a person cycling hits a pothole, a helmet would act as a significant injury preventer, cushioning the impact of their head against the asphalt. But if a person cycling is run over by a 13,000-pound truck, they and their helmet would be crushed.”

The article also raises the specter that helmets may not provide as much protection as we commonly believe.

“There is also evidence that drivers are more reckless when driving near cyclists wearing helmets, that laws requiring helmets make people less likely to ride a bike, that repealing those laws would make people more likely to ride a bike, and evidence that this effect—fewer people riding bikes—actually increases the number of per-capita bike crashes. While a higher number of people who ride bikes in an area is linked to fewer bicyclists showing up injured at local hospitals, there is no such correlation for areas that require bicycle helmets by law. Further, among countries with high rates of bicycling, the ones where people wear helmets the least also have the lowest cyclist fatality rates. In the United States, which has the highest rate of helmet use of all those countries, the rate of cyclist fatalities is also highest.

That is certainly food for thought. The article goes on to point out that Giro, a major helmet manufacturer, admits it does not design its helmets to provide protection from cars. Additionally, studies have shown that ticket citations for failing to wear a helmet are disproportionately given to people from marginalized backgrounds.

So What is the Solution?

Helmets have their place – but they are not a substitute for protected bike lanes, laws and regulations designed to protect cyclists and motorists who are willing to share to road in a fair and peaceful manner.

Ultimately, cyclists can only do so much to protect themselves from fatal collisions. The onus remains on our communities and the politicians who lead them. Instead of an excessive focus on helmets or safety gear, or simply becoming inured to “accidents” occurring in perpetuity, we need to realize that most of these fatal incidents are fully preventable. By advocating for ourselves, we can ensure that the political will exists to protect cyclists.

Finding the Right Bicycle Accident Attorney

Gary Brustin is a lifelong cyclist and a specialist in bicycle accident law. In fact, these are the only types of cases he accepts. If you’ve been injured in a collision, we urge you to contact Gary for a complimentary consultation.

Serious bicycle accidents often result in head trauma. Fortunately, the law provides a path forward to help victims receive fair compensation for their injuries.

Wearing a helmet is an essential safety measure for cyclists. Research published by Reuters shows that helmets reduce the odds of death after a collision by 44%, while reducing the odds of a traumatic brain injury by 52%.

Unfortunately, even the best helmet can’t always fully protect a rider. Some collisions are so violent they lead to death or serious brain injury regardless of safety measures.

Let’s take a closer look at the brain injury risks cyclists face, and how we can mitigate them.

Bicycling and Brain Injuries

Traumatic brain injuries typically occur when the human brain is deprived of oxygen or suffers a violent jolt related to high velocity impact. For example, a cyclist that collides with a car door that is opened in her path may be flung over the handlebars, striking her head on the pavement. This collision may result in her brain violently being shifted within her skull, a process that can lead to tearing or bruising of the brain. This may also result in the clotting or pooling of blood within or around the brain, an extremely dangerous and often fatal condition.

Collisions in general may involve anything from a mild concussion (though no brain injury is truly “mild”) to potentially severe and life-long disabilities. Symptoms of brain injuries often include:

• Headaches
• Light sensitivity
• Blurry vision
• Nausea
• Confusion
• Memory problems
• Emotional changes (such as inexplicable anger or impatience)

More serious brain damage may include cognitive impairment, loss of ability to work or function normally or even coma or death, in the worst cases.

In addition to brain injuries, victims of collisions may also suffer serious skull or facial fractures.

How Does the Court System Protect Cyclists?

Cyclists who have suffered a brain injury, whether relatively mild or severe, are protected by the legal system, an attorney can help ensure that victims are compensated for what they have suffered in terms of pain, loss of earning power and other variables.

Attorneys can also help level the playing field against insurance companies, who employ workers who are skilled negotiators and incentivized to get victims to settle for the lowest amount possible, regardless of their injuries.

It’s important, however, to work with an attorney that specializes in cycling litigation. Brain injury cases can be quite complex, and establishing liability and the injuries and losses the victim have suffered requires an experienced advocate.

Finding the Right Bicycle Accident Attorney

Gary Brustin is a lifelong cyclist and a specialist in bicycle accident law. In fact, these are the only types of cases he accepts. If you’ve been injured in a collision, we urge you to contact Gary for a complimentary consultation.

Cycling continues to grow more popular every year.

Federal data shows cyclist fatalities on the roads have increased almost every year over the last decade.

So what can we do to demand safer streets for everyone? A recent blog post from Cycling.com lists eight actionable steps that people can take right now to create better environment for cyclists.

1. No Texting While Driving. Cycling.com notes that technology exists to disable texting while cars are in motion, while the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration “recently announced design guidelines for car and phone companies to create a kind of “Driver Mode” that’s akin to airplane or do-not-disturb settings.” Both of these steps would help protect cyclists from one of the biggest dangers they face.
2. Better Driver’s Ed. Today, roughly 30 states require driver’s ed for motorists under 18 and the curriculum is not always comprehensive. Cycling.com notes that, in several state curriculums, “dooring” is never mentioned despite being a significant cause of cyclist crashes. They advise all states to emphasize dooring and a simple solution: the Dutch Reach, where drivers open their door with their right hand when parallel parked.
3. Fight for Stronger Laws: Here’s a stat they may surprise you: Only 12% of drivers are punished in collisions leading to cyclist fatalities. Stronger laws (and jail time rather than fines and probation) would help get drivers to pay more attention.
4. More Infrastructure: According to Cycling.com “a 2019 study from the University of Colorado tracked safety statistics in 13 U.S. cities and found that protected bike lanes actually helped reduce crash rates not just for cyclists, but for drivers too, and that the lanes themselves are the most probable reason for the change.” These findings mean we need cities to fulfill their promises to keep building better infrastructure.
5. Ride Responsibly: Safety is not all up to cities or car and truck drivers. Cyclists themselves must ensure they have situational awareness and proceed carefully and responsibly.
6. Report Hostile Drivers. Hostile drivers tend to be repeat bad actors, so it is important to take a stand. Cycling.com encourages cyclists to “call in a report giving the best description you can of the vehicle, license plate, occupants, incident, and direction the harasser is headed. (If you’re in imminent danger, call 911 instead.) Use a POV or cell phone camera if you can; the evidence is usually admissible in court.” Sounds like great advice!
7. Stay Visible: Cycling.com notes that a study from Denmark published in 2013 found that riders with daytime running lights were 19 percent less likely to be hit by drivers than a control group without. This is more evidence that visibility is critical, especially near dusk or dawn or in foggy conditions.

Keep Pedaling: A 2016 study in Hong Kong found that when drivers see more cyclists in a particular part of town, they drive more carefully there. This finding has been replicated elsewhere, giving credence to the notion that drivers are more cautious when they regularly share the road with cyclists

Finding the Right Bicycle Accident Attorney

Gary Brustin is a lifelong cyclist and a specialist in bicycle accident law. In fact, these are the only types of cases he accepts. If you’ve been injured in a collision, we urge you to contact Gary for a complimentary consultation.

California is hardly a paragon of cycling safety. With nearly 500 local cyclists dying on California roads in one recent three-year stretch, we rank as one of the most dangerous states in the nation.

This situation has caused some cyclists to seek shelter in an unlikely place: The sidewalk.

Yet, is this really a good idea – or legal? Let’s take a closer look.

The Sidewalk: An Imperfect Refuge

First, let’s address the legal question: Can you cycle on the sidewalk? The answer is not a clear cut yes or no. While there is no state law governing this issue, local jurisdictions have a patchwork of varying regulations. Some permit it, some do not, and some only permit it in certain areas or under certain circumstances.

Obviously, a cyclist passing through a variety of municipalities is unlikely to plan ahead and create a sidewalk route based on local ordinances.

So now that we’ve addressed the legal question, let’s tackle the practical issue: Is this a good idea?

While the sidewalk may seem like a refuge from dangerous and hostile motorists, it’s no perfect refuge. Sharing a sidewalk with slow moving pedestrians when you’re traveling up to 20 miles per hour can be a recipe for serious collisions.

Other hazards, including opening curb side car doors and stop and start intersections, also complicate the picture.

So, What’s the Bottom Line?

Cycling on the sidewalk may or may not be legal in your jurisdiction, so it’s advisable to check your local laws. There is nothing wrong with moving onto a sidewalk if the road becomes dangerous – you’ll just want to do so with caution. You don’t end up colliding with a pedestrian and becoming a defendant in a personal injury case.

Advance knowledge of local rules, smart decisions about when to use the sidewalk and extra caution  are the keys to ensuring that everyone shares sidewalks safely.

Follow these suggestions, and you’ll be doing your part to keep California just a little bit safer for everyone who shares its roads and streets.

Finding the Right Bicycle Accident Attorney

Gary Brustin is a lifelong cyclist and a specialist in bicycle accident law. In fact, these are the only types of cases he accepts. If you’ve been injured in a collision, we urge you to contact Gary for a complimentary consultation.

The bill contains language aimed to help protect cyclists against autonomous vehicles by using connected beacons, but experts aren’t certain that the plan will work as intended.

In the near future, cyclists may be asked to wear a beacon to help prevent self-driving vehicles from running them down.

That’s the takeaway from a section of the new infrastructure bill that was recently passed by Congress and signed into law by President Joe Biden.

The $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill contains language that concerns research into autonomous driving and cycling safety. The bill says that the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, in coordination with the Intelligent Transportation Systems Joint Program Office and the Federal

Highway Administration, will “expand vehicle-to-pedestrian research efforts focused on incorporating bicyclists and other vulnerable road users into the safe deployment of connected vehicle systems.”

This collaboration will produce a report that will be submitted to Congress that details the findings of the research along with an “analysis of the extent to which applications supporting vulnerable

road users can be accommodated within existing spectrum allocations for connected vehicle systems.”

These connected systems are largely composed of sensors that are placed on posts and signs. These sensors have transponders that help them communicate with connected vehicles and autonomous cars and trucks.

Adding bicycles into this mix will require addition technology, likely in the form of a beacon. These beacons will theoretically help protect cyclists by integrating bikes into the connected system, allowing vehicles to maneuver around them and prevent collisions.

Yet not everyone is convinced this idea will work well in practice.

The Limitations of the Beacon Approach

In a recent article on Forbes.com, transport historian Peter Norton says a future that includes connected systems and beacons may be more problematic than we think. Forbes reports the following:

The more likely version of the future is deeply dystopian, says transport historian Peter Norton. Only the beacon-equipped will be spotted, he fears. Those choosing—say, for economic or privacy reasons—not to fit bicycle-to-vehicle beacons will be blamed for being hit by sensor-equipped cars,

believes Norton, author of Autonorama, a new book which details the potential civil liberty issues that pedestrians and cyclists may face from the roll-out of driverless vehicles.

“I have a hard time picturing how we get automated driving systems that reliably detect bicyclists not equipped with beacons,” says Norton, who is associate professor of history in the Department of Engineering and Society at the University of Virginia. “We know from research that detecting cyclists is one of the hardest things that autonomous vehicle developers have had to face. Beacons may

increase the risk for cyclists because, if they give drivers the message that the car is watching out for cyclists, but the car is actually not doing that particularly well, then we make the situation for cyclists more dangerous.”

Other observers have criticized the infrastructure bill for providing massive amounts of highway funding, while offering comparatively little in terms of mass or alternative transit.

This means more of the same for cyclists: Congested roads, car and truck-centric transportation policies and an uncertain future with regard to safety and autonomy.

Finding the Right Bicycle Accident Attorney

Gary Brustin is a lifelong cyclist and a specialist in bicycle accident law. In fact, these are the only types of cases he accepts. If you’ve been injured in a collision, we urge you to contact Gary for a complimentary consultation.

If a new proposed bill becomes law, California cyclists may soon be able to roll through stop signs when they feel it is safe to do so.

Assemblymember Tasha Boerner Horvath, D-Encinitas, who backs AB 122, said the “stop sign as yield sign” policy has been shown to make cycling safer in other states while also encouraging more people to ride.

“We must encourage smarter, safer, more efficient transportation options that help people choose to get out of their cars. This cuts down on greenhouse gas emissions,” Boerner Horvath said. “AB 122 encourages safe riding in our state by allowing cyclists to spend less time in dangerous intersections.”

According to Boerner Horvath, the no-stop when safe to cycle policy is currently the law in nine other states. She pointed to data from Delaware that showed a 23% decrease in intersection cycling crashes in the 30 months after that state adopted the new policy.

Not Everyone is Onboard, However

While the bill passed the assembly, support was not unanimous. Several people in the Assembly spoke out forcefully against the change, asserting that it could confuse drivers and potentially create more collisions.

“This to me is a very toxic bill,” said Assemblyman Tom Lackey, R-Palmdale. “Because it has to do with public safety. It’s going to create confusion for motorists. Not that they’re not confused already.”

Lackey pointed out that the bill would also apply to electric bikes that can travel at higher rates of speed.

The bill passed by a 50-17 vote and now sits on the desk of Governor Newsom. Should he sign the bill, it will create a six-year pilot period during which the change will be evaluated. Once that period elapses, a review would take place.

Until then, California cyclists would be free to travel through quiet intersections without making unnecessary stops.

Finding the Right Bicycle Accident Attorney

Gary Brustin is a lifelong cyclist and a specialist in bicycle accident law. In fact, these are the only types of cases he accepts. If you’ve been injured in a collision, we urge you to contact Gary for a complimentary consultation.

All bike lanes are not created equal.

That is the gist of a recent article in “StreetsBlog” outlining the ongoing battle between Bay Area city officials and safe streets advocates.

While Oakland and other Bay Area communities have increased the number of bike lanes in recent years, many of them are of the “unprotected” variety. In other words, they feature some fresh paint and some bicycle signs, and not much else.

What Makes a Bike Lane Protected?

Protected bike lanes are far safer for cyclists and include features such as:

• Being physically separated from the street by using curbs, posts, planters, vertically raised paths etc.
• Exclusively designed for bicycle use, with no pedestrians or cars mixing except at some intersections
• Still being on or adjacent to the roadway and part of the street grid

Unfortunately, StreetsBlog notes that the Bay Area has fallen behind some other cities in terms of cyclist protection:

“The city of Cambridge, Massachusetts passed a ground-breaking “Cycling Safety Ordinance” two years ago. It integrated the requirement, now enshrined in the city’s municipal code, to install “a Permanent Separated Bicycle Lane” whenever streets are reconstructed.

“The ordinance, which passed 7-0…will bind the city to provide protected bike infrastructure for streets that are included in its bike master plan except in ‘rare’ circumstances, which city officials will be required to justify. The ordinance requires that vertical physical barriers be included.”

No such ordinance has been passed in the Bay Area, although StreetsBlog notes some “watered down” attempts have been made. City officials have claimed that neighborhoods may not yet be ready for the implementation of protected lanes.

No Protected Lanes at the New Athletics’ Ballpark

The controversy was freshly ignited when it was revealed that plans for the Oakland Athletics’ ballpark and the area around it did not contain protected bike lanes. In an editorial, StreetsBlog made the following argument in favor of creating tougher new ordinances:

“Imagine if it took a “public consultation process” before EMTs could administer CPR to a dying cyclist or pedestrian, freshly mashed by an errant motorist; why should we have a public process when deciding whether or not to install protected bike lanes and intersections that are proven to prevent collisions and save lives? It should be obvious that crucial, life-saving safety features can’t be optional. And it’s long overdue for Bay Area lawmakers to follow Cambridge’s example and start authoring and pushing both city ordinances and new state bills to make protected, high-quality bike lanes and intersections a requirement for reconstructing streets everywhere.”

And that is an argument that just about all California cyclists can get behind.

Finding the Right Bicycle Accident Attorney

Gary Brustin is a lifelong cyclist and a specialist in bicycle accident law. In fact, these are the only types of cases he accepts. If you’ve been injured in a collision, we urge you to contact Gary for a complimentary consultation.

A substantial rise in auto accidents is one interesting development related to the COVID-19 pandemic. The National Highway and Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) reported that 38,680 people died in traffic accidents in the U.S. in 2020 — the largest number since 2007. This spike occurred even though motorists drove 430 billion fewer miles in 2020 relative to 2021, according to the NHTSA.

Most traffic safety organizations placed the blame for the jump on more aggressive drivers. With traffic at record lows, drivers became emboldened to speed and drive recklessly.

That raises another interesting question: How did all of this affect cyclists?

Sharing the Road During a Period of Record Deaths

A recent report from Outside Magazine shed some light on how COVID-19 traffic conditions affected road safety for cyclists. The magazine compiled all available crash data involving cyclists in 2020. Their findings were recently summarized by Advocacy Advance, a safer streets non-profit organization. According to Advocacy Advance, the Outside Magazine study showed the following:

• An estimated 675 cyclists were killed in accidents during 2020. The previous year’s bicycle fatalities totaled 846.
• Even though there was a decrease in the number of bicyclist deaths in 2020, traffic was reduced by 41 percent for months at a time in 2020.
• More than one-fourth of bicycle fatalities were caused by hit-and-run accidents in 2020.
• The states with the highest numbers of cyclist fatalities were California (118), Florida (90), New York (44), Texas (44 each), and Louisiana (34). Louisiana had the highest number of cyclist deaths per million residents at 7.3 fatalities per one million residents.
• Bicycle deaths were almost equal on urban roads and rural roads in 2020. About a third of the bicycle deaths occurred on these two types of roads.
• Arterial roads continue to be very dangerous for bicyclists because of the speed limits and road designs
• The warmer months from May through August saw the highest number of bicycle deaths in 2020. The highest number of cyclist deaths in 2020 was in July, with 84 fatalities.

While fewer cars on the road led to fewer cyclist deaths in 2020, the long-term trend remains troubling. Cycling accidents have been on a sustained ten-year increase, with 2018 ranking as the worst year in history for cyclist fatalities.

While 2019 offered a slight respite, as traffic volume returns to normal levels, cycling incidents are also returning to their prior levels. Cyclists should continue to practice situational awareness, advocate for safer shared streets — and use the legal system to defend their rights when necessary.

Finding the Right Bicycle Accident Attorney

Gary Brustin is a lifelong cyclist and a specialist in bicycle accident law. In fact, these are the only types of cases he accepts. If you’ve been injured in a collision, we urge you to contact Gary for a complimentary consultation.

If you’re a cyclist, few things send more of a shiver down your spine than a traffic collision. The idea of being struck by thousands of pounds of moving steel — while having little more than a helmet and safety gear for protection — is frightening.

Unfortunately, too many drivers fail to give cyclists the respect and courtesy to which they are entitled. Drivers also fail to grasp the danger they place cyclists in when they fail to pay attention to the road, drive carelessly, or operate a vehicle while impaired.

If you find yourself in this scenario, you may be entitled to compensation. Understanding how to best navigate that process can be tricky, however. With that in mind, let’s take a closer look at the steps you should take if you are in a collision.

Receiving Compensation for Crash-Related Losses

If you are injured in a cycling accident, you may choose to pursue a claim with the insurance company that represents the other party. This is called a “third-party claim.” Because you are not the policyholder, pursuing such claims may present more of a challenge than dealing directly with your own insurer. The insurer for the other party may attempt to claim that you are partially or fully at-fault for the collision or question the extent or validity of your injuries or the damage to your bicycle.

Additionally, most cyclists are not trained negotiators. Insurance companies, on the other hand, employ people who are specially trained to get victims to settle for the lowest dollar amount possible. This experience gap often results in victims receiving a much lower payout, simply because they are unfamiliar with the negotiating process. This may cause serious problems down the line. If an injury proves to be worse than initially thought, the victim will not be able to reopen the claim and seek additional damages. All settlements are final.

How to Level the Playing Field

While insurance companies may exploit the unfamiliarity or inexperience of victims for their own financial gain, there is one solution that allows you to level the playing field: Working with a law firm that specializes in bicycle accident litigation.

These firms have the necessary experience to guide you through the process and help ensure that you are not victimized twice: Once by the collision, and a second time by accepting less than what you are owed. An experienced attorney can help ensure that settlement negotiations are fair. If these negotiations do not bear fruit, an attorney can also help you receive the compensation to which you’re entitled by filing a civil case on your behalf.

Regardless of how the case is resolved, working with an experienced attorney is the best way to ensure that all parties are on equal footing — and that victims are treated fairly.

Finding the Right Bicycle Accident Attorney

Gary Brustin is a lifelong cyclist and a specialist in bicycle accident law. In fact, these are the only types of cases he accepts. If you’ve been injured in a collision, we urge you to contact Gary for a complimentary consultation.

Cyclists in Los Angeles are benefiting from some recent bikeway improvements — although the pace of such improvements still lags considerably when compared to recent years, according to new research by Streetsblog.

According to Streetsblog, the following improvements were made in the last year:

• 6.3 miles of new bike lanes on Avalon Boulevard in South L.A. – mostly buffered, with some protected stretches
• New protected bike lanes (alongside new bus-only lanes) on 5th and 6th Streets in downtown L.A.
• New protection added to existing bike lanes on Olive Street, Grand Avenue, and Figueroa Street in downtown L.A.
• Two key blocks of new bike lanes on Figueroa Street in Chinatown
• New bike lanes on 7th Street in Koreatown

While such upgrades are undoubtedly helpful, they fall considerably short of the goals outlined by former Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who mandated 40 miles of new bikeways to be created annually (a goal that was not quite reached). Overall bikeway progress has declined under the new administration, according to Streetsblog.

Other new bikeway improvements reported by Streetsblog include 1.5 miles of protected bike lanes on Foothill Boulevard, newly protected lanes near LAX on Manchester Avenue and conventional bike lanes upgraded to protected lanes along Winnetka Avenue in the Northeast Valley and new buffers along Martin Luther King Boulevard.

What to Do if You Are in a Cycling Collision

While these bikeway improvements are a step in the right direction, more needs to be done to protect LA cyclists. In the meantime, the legal system is here to help if you are injured as the result of someone’s negligence. The right attorney can help guide you through a sometimes difficult process, whether that means dealing with an insurance company or taking an injury case to trial. It’s important, however, to work with an attorney who specializes in bike accident litigation.

Finding the Right Bicycle Accident Attorney

Gary Brustin is a lifelong cyclist and a specialist in bicycle accident law. In fact, these are the only types of cases he accepts. If you’ve been injured in a collision, we urge you to contact Gary for a complimentary consultation.