When it comes to pedestrian safety, understanding right-of-way laws is crucial for both pedestrians and drivers in Illinois. By knowing who has the right to proceed in specific situations, individuals can prioritize safety and avoid traffic violations.

In Illinois, pedestrian deaths have seen a troubling rise. According to the Illinois Department of Transportation (IDOT), there were 4,940 pedestrian-involved crashes in 2017, resulting in 148 pedestrian fatalities. Among these fatalities, 128 occurred on urban roads, while 20 happened on rural roads. 

Rights of Pedestrians 

As a pedestrian in Illinois, drivers have a legal obligation to come to a complete stop and yield under the following circumstances:

Whether you are involved in a car accident, truck accident, or slip and fall accident, you may suffer from a serious head injury. Depending on how you hurt your head, the injury can impact your motor functions, emotions, and thoughts. If you suffered a traumatic brain injury (TBI), you may not be able to work or live your life as you did before your accident.

Signs of a Mild Traumatic Brain Injury 

While most head injuries from personal injuries and motor vehicle accidents are considered mild, they are the opposite for the victim. Common signs of a mild traumatic brain include the following:

• Dizziness and balance loss

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 Premises liability governs the legal responsibilities of property owners or managers for injuries that occur on their property. Under Illinois law, property owners have a duty to maintain their premises in a reasonably safe condition and to warn visitors of any known dangers. If a property owner breaches this duty and someone is injured because of it, the owner may be held liable for damages.

Duty of Care 

In Illinois, the duty of care owed by property owners to visitors depends on the visitor's status on the property. The law distinguishes between three types of visitors: invitees, licensees, and trespassers.

Invitees are individuals who are invited onto the property for the owner's benefit, such as customers in a store. Business or property owners owe invitees the highest duty of care and must inspect their property regularly to identify and correct any hazards.

Most people assume that items purchased from a retail store or online retailer will work the way they are intended to and will not cause them harm. While this is true for the majority of consumer products, there are times that a defective or malfunctioning product causes a consumer to be injured or even killed. If you were hurt or you have lost a loved one and you suspect that a defective product is to blame, you may be entitled to financial compensation.

Product Liability Basics

Products may contain three main types of defects under Illinois product liability law:

• Design defects: A design defect occurs before a product is manufactured. The inherent design of the product may be flawed in some way that makes the product dangerous – even when it is used as intended. A design defect will be present in an entire line of products.
• Manufacturing defects: A manufacturing defect occurs when something goes wrong during the manufacture or construction of a product. The defect may only affect some of the products.
• Inadequate consumer warnings: “Failure to warn” defects stem from a product containing inadequate warnings about potential hazards or insufficient instructions on how to the product safely.

If a defective product leads to someone’s injury or death, the company responsible for the defect may be liable for the harm caused by the defective product.

Imagine this scenario: As car 1 is lawfully passing through a dangerous intersection, car 2 comes from their right, runs the stop sign, and T-bones car 1 on the passenger side. The passenger in car 1 suffers severe injuries that incapacitate them for months and leave lasting damage. In most cases, you could rightfully assume that car 2 is at fault for causing this car accident; therefore, the driver of car 2 and their insurance company will have to pay out thousands of dollars in damages to the car 1 passenger.  But is that always the case? No, not always.

In what situations would someone who runs a stop sign not be the at-fault driver in an accident such as the one described above?

One situation is a medical emergency. Suppose the driver of car 2, the one who ran the stop sign, suffered a heart attack or stroke that caused them to lose consciousness. This can happen with no previous warning signs. As long as the driver had no indications that they were not safe to drive, a sudden medical emergency is a defense against liability for the accident.