Nearly everywhere you look here in Denver, there are people walking. Such a concentration of people on foot tends to increase the chances of pedestrian accidents. However, there seem to be certain groups who become involved in these accidents more often than others.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 5,376 pedestrians died in crashes across the country in 2015. In fact, the chance of dying in an accident increases by 1.5 times for those on foot versus those in vehicles. In that same year, 129,000 people ended up in emergency rooms with survivable injuries after being involved in a pedestrian crash.
A disproportionately large number of the victims were either children or adults age 65 or older. Those in the latter group made up approximately 19 percent of the deceased pedestrians and around 13 percent of those who suffered injuries in 2015. The data regarding children involved in pedestrian accidents in 2015 indicates that one out of every five under the age of 15 died. Alcohol also played a significant role in these accidents that year, along with speed, time of day and location.
Living in an urban area like Denver increases your risk of being seriously injured as you walk the city’s streets. If you were the victim of such an accident (or you lost a family member in that manner), you may be able to seek restitution from the driver believed responsible. As would be the case in other pedestrian accidents, you would need to establish to the court that your injuries, or the death of your loved one, resulted from the negligence of another. Having assistance in providing the appropriate evidence of this to a civil court may increase your ability to achieve a monetary judgment for documented damages.
Source: cdc.gov, “Pedestrian Safety“, Accessed on July 22, 2017