Riding on levee trail as I always do. A group of high school runners moved aside and at the last minute one of them jumped right in front of me, colliding with me and running me down the embankment. My fork broke in half and I don’t know what else. My leg is injured and I’m cut up. Is he responsible for paying for my bike repairs? Do I have any recourse? The running coach kept saying it was an accident over and over like it’s my problem now.
by DesignerCommercial94
16 Comments
It’s usually the cyclists responsibility to yield to pedestrians unless it is a designated bike only path. How fast were you going and did you warn them before you passed? Could you have given more space? I have to imagine you were going pretty fast for that kind of damage.
Sorry this happened to you.
There is no way that you could get any money out of this unless you go to court unfortunately. You could threaten to sue and hope the parents just give you some cash pretrial. Did you get their contact info?
Well that’s sucks. Replacing the fork should not be a problem. Looks like a generic single speed bike/fixie. Forks for those are cheap.
In common sense terms, it sounds like the kid made a dumb, unpredictable move that caused your crash. In the more rigid hierarchy of yielding on a shared use path, you are probably still technically in the wrong; the argument would be that you need to slow down sufficiently such that this kind of accident is avoidable since pedestrians don’t walk in exact straight lines. The same way that the rear car is responsible in a collision, even if the front car brakes unpredictably, and thus you have to account for stopping distances.
I’m sorry this happened: It sounds painful and is a real bummer for the bike. Not sure there is any recourse from anyone for anything other than to just move on and lick your wounds. If you felt very strongly that the runner was negligent or had malicious intent you could theoretically try to recover damages from the runner or coach/team in civil court (at least in the United States) but beyond the fact that it would be totally impractical in this scenario, your “burden of proof” would be quite high given that the baseline requirement is for you to yield. Perhaps the only exception would be if they were not authorized to be running team practices on this public path. Anyway, if you feel strongly go to small claims court but I think your odds are close to zero.
I’ve got a similar set of concerns around mile 21 of my commute: on a levy that’s a very popular running spot near a college and a high school with a cross country running team.
I would encourage you to look at this same situation as if you were a car and the kid was a pedestrian or cyclist. If the kid wasn’t doing some malicious shit it’s pretty easy to argue that you were going too fast for conditions and finally got unlucky.
If you’re of a mind, give your info to the coach and ask them to pass it on to the parents. If the kid has some unnoticed injuries it’ll be good for them to be able to get in touch with you.
If someone heard the kid say they wanted to block you maybe you could do something?
Otherwise I’d guess they didn’t see you and wanted to run around those blocking.
Whenever I can I roll off the asphalt and on to the grass on the side to avoid pedestrians / runners / roller bladers / baby strollers.
If there’s no grass to roll on to I make sure I unclip one foot & walk the bike one-footed past the other users.
OP, Take the L. You hitting a pedestrian, in whatever circumstance, is a bad look no matter what. This isn’t about the law or rules, this is just personal responsibility.
Sorry this halo ended and I hope you and the bike are on the road, soon.
This is one of those things where you’re overtaking, so the onus is on you to avoid them. I’d recommend a bell followed by “on your left” as I’m approaching to pass.
This is not going how OP wanted and that is good.
Damn, next time you will have to slow down for people in front of you. They can’t see you behind them. Lesson learned. Glad you are ok.
Just as cars have the responsibility to yield to cyclists in a safe and controllable way, cyclists have the responsibility to yield to pedestrians. If you were going fast enough to crash that badly avoiding a pedestrian, you were going way too fast. Either that, or you’re just not a very experienced/skill cyclist, despite what your bike may imply.
No difference between a student jumping out on you and a child running into your path in these sorts of situations, imo.
On the shared use paths in Ontario, everyone travels in the same direction. The onus is ALWAYS on the faster moving person/vehicle to ensure they are passing safely. Yes, it 100% sucks that a runner jumped in front of the OP, but 16mph isn’t exactly showing the running group that they respect their safety.
The only exception is horses. Everyone on the path is expected to yield to horses.
So far, what have you learned?
you recklessly hit a kid on your bike and you want recourse? The running coach is right, and it is your problem. honestly the runner would be in a better situation to expect you to pay for a doc visit
Frame looks compromised as well: top tube and down tube look off.
Is the kid okay?