Broward County Bicycle Accident Lawyers
Riding a bike in Broward County brings traffic on I-95 and I-595, beach routes along A1A, and busy streets around Sunrise Boulevard, Broward Boulevard, and Las Olas where drivers watch for trucks and SUVs first and notice cyclists last. A crash on Broward roads can leave a rider with broken bones, head or spine injuries, and days filled with medical appointments and calls from insurance companies that move far quicker than recovery.
If a bicycle accident in Broward County or anywhere in Florida left you injured, call Lesser, Landy, Smith & Siegel, PLLC at (954) 495-2715 to see if you may be entitled to compensation. You pay nothing unless the firm takes your case and wins.
Do I Have a Bicycle Accident Case?
Cyclists usually want a straight answer about whether Florida law gives a real path to compensation or whether an insurance company gets to decide how things end. A bicycle accident case exists when:
- Someone acts carelessly
- The conduct causes a crash
- You end up with injuries and measurable loss like medical bills, lost pay, or long-term health changes.
How We Evaluate Potential Cases
Our bicycle accident lawyers in Broward evaluate how the collision happened, which person controlled each vehicle or hazard at key points, and what changed in your life afterward.
We also review coverage layers, including the driver’s bodily injury policy, any uninsured or underinsured motorist coverage, and health insurance that helped with bills, all of which helps us maximize your compensation.
Start With a Free Consultation
You do not need every detail sorted out before you call a lawyer. Short, focused conversation with a Broward County bicycle accident lawyer gives a more reliable answer than what an adjuster says in a first call.
Key Steps to Take After Bicycle Crash in Broward County
Pain, shock, and confusion make decisions harder in the days after a crash, especially when you juggle treatment, work, and bike repairs at the same time. Clear steps help protect both health and your case.
Use this sequence as a guide:
- Get a full medical evaluation: Emergency care or urgent care should check head, neck, back, and any area that hurts, and follow-up visits with primary doctors or specialists document ongoing symptoms that may not show up on day one.
- Follow through with treatment: Missed appointments or gaps in care give insurance companies a chance to argue that injuries healed faster than you describe or came from a different cause.
- Preserve scene evidence: Photos of the roadway, bike lane, vehicles, debris, skid marks, and visible injuries help reconstruct what happened, including visibility, lane position, and traffic control devices.
- Save the bike and gear: Don’t rush repairs or disposal. Damage to the frame, wheels, helmet, and clothing can show impact points and help experts explain how the crash unfolded.
- Collect witness and driver information: Names, phone numbers, license plate details, insurance information, and short notes about what each person saw help when memories fade or stories change.
- Keep all records together: Hospital bills, therapy invoices, receipts for medications or equipment, and wage records from work belong in one place so that your lawyer can prove the full financial impact.
- Limit conversation with insurance companies: Provide basic contact and policy details, then wait on recorded statements or broad medical authorizations until you speak with a lawyer who handles serious injury cases.
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Our bike accident attorneys will take over direct communication with insurance companies, request records, and keep the case moving while you focus on healing.
Who May Be Responsible for a Bicycle Crash?
Drivers typically cause bicycle crashes, yet responsibility can extend beyond the person behind the wheel. Case work looks at every party that contributed to the dangerous situation.
Depending on the facts, responsible parties may include:
- Drivers who speed, pass too closely, drift into bike lanes, or ignore traffic signals
- Employers whose drivers cause crashes in company vehicles during work
- Property owners who create hazards near driveways, sidewalks, or paths that push cyclists into traffic
- Public entities responsible for unsafe road design, missing signs, or broken signals
- Product manufacturers whose defective bikes, tires, or components fail under normal use
Different parties bring different insurance policies and procedures, including special claim rules when a crash ties back to a public agency. Lawyers at Lesser, Landy, Smith & Siegel work through all those layers at the start so that no deadline or coverage source gets missed.
How Our Lawyers Build Winning Bicycle Accident Cases
The attorneys at Lesser, Landy, Smith & Siegel build bicycle accident cases by tying evidence from the crash scene to records from doctors and work, then using that foundation to press for fair value. Work starts with liability and continues with detailed documentation of treatment and income loss, then moves into negotiation and, when needed, court so the result reflects what the crash actually took from you.
Learning What Happened
Work on the liability side focuses on the story of the crash:
- Reviewing police reports, crash diagrams, and any citations
- Visiting the scene to study sightlines, traffic flow, and how bike lanes or shoulders actually function there
- Looking for camera footage from nearby homes, businesses, or traffic systems
- Speaking with drivers, cyclists, and independent witnesses about speed, signals, and lane position
Our work exposes unsafe driving habits, poor infrastructure, and conflicting stories that need to be tested against physical evidence.
Documenting Injuries and Income Loss
Medical records and wage information anchor the damages side of a bicycle accident case. Some of the actions we take are as follows.
- Requesting complete medical records and itemized bills from every provider
- Tracking diagnostic tests, surgeries, injections, and therapy over time
- Asking treating doctors for opinions about permanent restrictions and future treatment needs
- Gathering pay stubs, employer statements, and tax records that show lost pay and changes in earning capacity
Medical records carry significant weight in a bicycle accident case because they connect injuries and treatment directly to the crash and document how those injuries limit work and daily life.
Dealing With Insurance Companies
Bicycle crashes in Broward County can trigger several different insurance policies at once: the driver’s liability coverage, uninsured or underinsured motorist coverage, health insurance, and sometimes coverage tied to an employer or rideshare platform. Lesser, Landy, Smith & Siegel handle direct communications, organize evidence into clear demands, and push back when an adjuster downplays fault or minimizes injuries.
When negotiation does not lead to a fair range, our Florida bicycle accident lawyers can file suit within the deadline, take depositions, and prepare for trial, and that willingness to keep pushing instead of accepting a low offer can change how insurance companies view risk.
Fault Rules and Comparative Negligence in Florida
Florida uses negligence rules that focus on whether each party acted with reasonable care under the circumstances. Bicycle accident cases follow the same basic structure.
Four elements in a bicycle accident case
Cases rest on four elements:
- Duty of care: drivers and others owe cyclists reasonable care under traffic and road conditions
- Breach of duty: a person falls short of that standard through choices like speeding, distraction, unsafe lane changes, or failure to yield
- Causation: that breach leads directly to the crash and the injuries that followed
- Damages: the cyclist faces physical harm and financial loss that can be documented
Our team gathers evidence that ties each element together and links a driver’s failure to yield or unsafe pass to specific injuries shown on imaging and in treatment records.
Florida’s modified comparative negligence rule
Under Florida’s current comparative negligence rule for most negligence cases, a cyclist can recover compensation even with a share of fault, as long as that share does not reach more than 50 percent. Any percentage assigned to the cyclist reduces the recovery by that same percentage. When a cyclist’s share crosses that 50 percent line there is generally no opportunity for financial recovery.
Insurance companies typically push on that rule and try to direct blame toward the cyclist with arguments about things like lane position, speed, lighting, or helmet use. We deflect their arguments with traffic statutes, roadway evidence, and expert analysis instead of accepting blame-shifting that does not match the facts.
What Compensation Can a Bicycle Accident Case Recover?
Serious bicycle crashes in Florida can lead to surgery and extended time away from work, which puts extra pressure on medical bills and household expenses. Compensation in a bicycle accident case needs to track the full financial hit from the crash and the ways injuries restrict daily life.
Depending on the case, recoverable damages may include:
- Emergency treatment, hospital care, specialist visits, therapy, and prescription costs
- Future medical care, including surgery, injections, assistive devices, or home modifications tied to the crash
- Lost pay from missed workdays and reduced hours during recovery
- Reduced earning capacity when lasting limits force a job change or lower income
- Bicycle, helmet, and other gear repair or replacement
- Physical pain, reduced strength, and limits on mobility
- Emotional harm like anxiety, depressed mood, or sleep disruption related to the crash
- Loss of enjoyment of regular activities, sports, and time with family and friends
We will match those categories to medical and wage records as well as your own description of daily life so settlement demands line up with documented losses and future needs.
Statute of Limitations: How Long You Have to File
Florida shortened the statute of limitations for most negligence cases, including bicycle accidents, from four years to two years for crashes that occurred on or after March 24, 2023. Missing that deadline usually blocks a cyclist from bringing a case, even when fault looks clear and injuries remain serious.
Crashes that happened before that date may still fall under the older four-year period, yet analysis gets fact-specific and benefits from a careful review. Bicycle accidents tied to public entities, including city vehicles or unsafe public roads, add separate notice and timing rules that can run much shorter than two years.
Our Local Experience With Broward County Bicycle Crashes
Broward County has distinct traffic flow, cycling routes, and risk points that repeat across cases. Experience with that local picture helps a lawyer know where to look and what arguments to expect.
Common settings for bicycle crashes include:
- Beach stretches along A1A where parked cars, rideshare vehicles, and tourist traffic crowd bike lanes and shoulders
- Urban stretches near Las Olas Boulevard, Broward Boulevard, and Sunrise Boulevard with frequent turns, driveways, and lane shifts
- Neighborhood streets where drivers back out of driveways or turn across sidewalks and paths
- Multi-lane roads where cyclists share space with high-speed traffic during commutes or training rides
Hospitals, urgent care centers, and therapy practices in Broward follow familiar paperwork and billing habits as well. Lesser, Landy, Smith & Siegel work within that local reality and ground strategy in how Broward adjusters and juries actually respond to bicycle accident evidence.
Bicycle Accident Questions From Riders
Do I have a case if I was not wearing a helmet?
Florida law does not require every cyclist to wear a helmet, although helmets help reduce certain injuries. Insurance companies may argue that lack of a helmet caused or worsened head injuries, yet driver conduct still sits at the center of the case. Lawyers at Lesser, Landy, Smith & Siegel separate lawful gear choices from attempts to dodge responsibility for unsafe driving.
What if the driver left the scene?
Hit-and-run bicycle crashes happen on busy streets and quiet neighborhood roads. Law enforcement may still identify the driver later through plate information, camera footage, or witnesses. Uninsured motorist coverage on your own policy can sometimes provide a path to recovery even when the driver never comes forward. Case evaluation looks at every available source instead of stopping with the first setback.
How long does a bicycle accident case take?
Timelines differ based on injury severity, treatment length, and how hard an insurance company fights fault or damages. Cases with clear liability and injuries that stabilize within a reasonable period may resolve through settlement within a shorter window, and cases that require surgery or lead to permanent limits, especially when fault stays heavily contested, may move into litigation and take substantially longer. Lawyers at the firm explain expected timing at the outset and give updates as conditions change.
Do I need a lawyer if the insurance company already offered money?
Initial offers usually focus on emergency care and short-term needs, not on future treatment, permanent limitations, or long-term income loss. Quick checks can feel helpful in the moment and still fall far below what the law allows based on your injuries. Conversation with a bicycle accident lawyer who regularly handles serious cases in Broward County can help you compare that offer with a grounded case value.
How do attorney fees work for bicycle accident cases?
Lesser, Landy, Smith & Siegel handle bicycle accident cases on a contingency fee basis. Clients do not pay attorney fees up front. Instead, the firm receives an agreed percentage of money recovered through settlement or verdict, along with reimbursement of case costs where allowed. A contingency framework lets injured cyclists pursue cases without taking on additional monthly bills while they recover.
Let Lesser, Landy, Smith & Siegel, PLLC Fight for You
Bicycle crashes in Broward County leave riders facing hospital visits, therapy, time away from work, and pressure from insurance companies that push quick, low settlements that do not match what recovery actually costs. Lesser, Landy, Smith & Siegel, PLLC use deep experience with serious injury cases in South Florida to push back with evidence, clear advocacy, and a plan that reflects your long-term needs instead of an adjuster’s budget.
Call (954) 495-2715 for a free consultation, speak directly with a Broward County bicycle accident lawyer about what happened, and let the team investigate fault, organize medical and wage documentation, and fight for the full compensation your injuries and losses justify.
