Texas Bicycle Accident Lawyers
Cyclists belong on Texas roads. When a driver hits one, we hold them accountable — every time.
Why Families Across Texas Trust Patterson Law Group
Cyclists have the same legal right to Texas roads as cars and the same vulnerability to serious injury as pedestrians. A driver who fails to look before opening a door, who buzzes a rider in a marked bike lane, who turns across a cyclist's path — that driver is responsible for what happens next.
Patterson Law Group represents injured cyclists across Texas. We've spent more than 30 years winning cases for clients in car wrecks, truck collisions, and bike incidents, and we know how to push back against the 'cyclists are reckless' bias that hurts these cases. The consultation is free. We work on a contingency fee.
If you've been hit on a bike — or if a loved one was killed while riding — we can help.
Offices in Fort Worth, Arlington, and San Antonio. Every case is taken on a contingency fee — no recovery, no fee.
Bicycle Cases We Handle
Bicycle crashes happen in recurring patterns. Our attorneys handle every variant:
Texas Bicycle Law
Texas Transportation Code §551.101 et seq. gives cyclists the same rights and responsibilities as motor vehicle operators on public roads. Drivers must give cyclists 'safe passing distance' (Texas law and many local ordinances), must not block bike lanes, and must yield when turning across a bike's path.
Helmet use is not required for adults under Texas state law (some cities have ordinances for children). And under comparative fault rules (CPRC §33.001), failure to wear a helmet is not, by itself, a complete defense — the question is causation. Insurance carriers will try to use it. We fight back.
Statute of limitations is two years from the date of the crash under CPRC §16.003. If the crash involved a road defect or government driver, notice deadlines can be much shorter.
How We Work With You
Our process is simple. You focus on your recovery. We handle everything else.
- 1 Call us. Tell us what happened. Free, confidential, no obligation. We'll give you an honest answer about whether you have a case.
- 2 We investigate. Police reports, surveillance footage, medical records, witness statements, expert consultations. We build the case the right way from day one.
- 3 You focus on healing. We handle every insurance call, every demand, every negotiation. If they refuse to pay fairly, we take them to trial.
Local Offices & City Pages
Patterson Law Group serves all injured Texans from our physical offices in Fort Worth, Arlington, and San Antonio. For city-specific information on this practice area:
How this complements existing sections
The Astro page currently uses the standard 8-H2 template. The sections below are additive and sit between the existing "Texas Bicycle Accident Law" block and the existing "How We Work" block. No duplication of the existing FAQ items.
Tone: confident, plainspoken, Texas-led. No fabricated case results, testimonials, or statistics. All statutory citations verified.
Common Causes of Bicycle Accidents in Texas
Most Texas bicycle crashes are not freak accidents — they follow a small set of recurring driver-behavior patterns. Knowing the pattern is how we frame liability before the insurance company frames it for us.
Right-hook crashes. A driver overtakes a cyclist on the cyclist's left and then turns right across the cyclist's path. This is the single most common urban bicycle crash. The cyclist enters the intersection going straight; the driver, who passed them moments earlier, cuts across. The driver's defense is almost always "I didn't see them."
Left-cross crashes. An oncoming driver turns left across the cyclist's lane of travel. The driver scans for a gap between cars and misses the cyclist in that same gap. These crashes happen at intersections, driveways, and parking lot entrances and frequently produce serious injuries because the cyclist is hit at impact angle perpendicular to travel.
Door-zone crashes (dooring). A driver or passenger opens a parked car's door into the path of an oncoming cyclist. Texas law (Transportation Code §545.418) prohibits opening a vehicle door on the side adjacent to moving traffic unless it is reasonably safe to do so. Dooring at speed throws the cyclist into the lane and exposes them to a secondary strike from following traffic.
Unsafe passing. Drivers buzzing cyclists with inches to spare. Several Texas cities — including Fort Worth and San Antonio — have adopted local ordinances requiring drivers to give cyclists at least three feet (or six feet for commercial vehicles) of clearance when passing. Violation of a local safe-passing ordinance is a negligence-per-se argument we routinely make.
Rear-end strikes. A driver running up on a cyclist from behind, usually because of distracted driving, speeding, or impairment. Often catastrophic. Phone-record subpoenas are standard.
Failure to yield at stop signs and signals. Drivers rolling stop signs or running red lights at intersections cyclists are entering. The most preventable category of crash.
Roadway hazards. Potholes, broken pavement, debris, drainage grates with bars parallel to travel, and unmarked construction zones. Where a municipal or state entity is responsible for the hazard, Texas Tort Claims Act notice deadlines kick in fast.
Texas Bicycle Law — Where Cyclists Have Rights and Where They Have Duties
Under Texas Transportation Code §551.101, a person operating a bicycle has all the rights and duties of a vehicle operator. Cyclists are not pedestrians and they are not second-class users of the road. They are vehicles. The defense will sometimes pretend otherwise.
Where cyclists must ride. Section 551.103 generally requires cyclists riding slower than the normal speed of traffic to ride as near as practicable to the right curb or edge of the roadway, with exceptions: when passing another vehicle moving in the same direction, when preparing to turn left, when reasonably necessary to avoid an unsafe condition (potholes, debris, opening car doors, narrow lane width that prevents safe side-by-side travel), and on a one-way roadway with two or more marked traffic lanes (where the cyclist may ride near the left curb).
Substandard-width lanes. When a lane is too narrow to share safely with a motor vehicle, a Texas cyclist is entitled to take the full lane. Defense lawyers like to argue the cyclist should have been "hugging the curb." Section 551.103's exceptions answer that.
Bicycle equipment. Section 551.104 requires a front white lamp visible from at least 500 feet and a rear red reflector or red lamp visible from 50 to 300 feet when riding at nighttime. Failure to use lights at night is the defense's favorite contributory-fault argument in nighttime cases.
Helmet law. Texas has no statewide adult helmet requirement. A handful of cities (including Austin for minors and some local park ordinances) impose narrower requirements. The absence of a helmet, by itself, is not a defense to the driver's negligence under Texas law, but expect the defense to argue causation: that helmet use would have reduced the head injury. This argument is fact-specific and rebuttable.
Comparative fault. Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code §33.001 applies. A cyclist who is 50% or less at fault recovers, with damages reduced by their fault share. At 51% or more, they recover nothing. Statute of limitations: §16.003 gives two years from the date of the crash. Governmental defendants (city, county, TxDOT) require Tort Claims Act notice within a much shorter window — often six months — and city charters can shorten that further.
Injuries We See in Bicycle Crash Cases
The cyclist's body has nothing between it and the road, the curb, the car bumper, the windshield, or the pavement. The injuries reflect that exposure.
Traumatic brain injury. Even with a helmet, head impact with a windshield, A-pillar, or pavement produces concussion, contusion, subdural and epidural hematomas, skull fracture, and diffuse axonal injury. Without a helmet, the injury escalates. Persistent post-concussive symptoms — headache, light sensitivity, cognitive fog, mood changes — are common and often dismissed by adjusters.
Facial fractures and dental injuries. Nose, orbital, mandibular, and maxillary fractures from face-first impact with pavement or hood. Lost or shattered teeth, requiring extensive dental and oral-surgical reconstruction.
Clavicle, scapula, and shoulder injuries. The instinct to brace produces distal radius and scaphoid fractures, AC joint separations, clavicle fractures (extremely common in cyclists), rotator cuff tears, and shoulder dislocations.
Rib fractures, pneumothorax, and pulmonary contusion. Chest impact with the road or the vehicle. Rib fractures are painful and slow to heal; pneumothorax can be life-threatening.
Pelvic and hip injuries. Bumper strikes catching the cyclist at hip height. Spinal injuries — vertebral fractures, disc herniations, and in worst cases incomplete or complete spinal cord injury — from rotation and ground impact.
Lower-extremity fractures. Tibia, fibula, femur, and patella fractures. Open fractures requiring multiple surgeries and external fixation. Ankle and foot fractures from pedal entrapment.
Road rash and degloving injuries. Sliding across asphalt strips skin and subcutaneous tissue. Severe road rash often requires debridement, skin grafts, and produces permanent scarring.
PTSD and cycling anxiety are real, documented, and compensable.
How PLG Investigates a Texas Bicycle Crash
Bicycle cases reward fast investigation. Many of the facts that matter — exactly where the cyclist was in the lane, exactly how the driver approached, how much clearance the driver gave — live in evidence that disappears quickly.
Video. Most urban Texas roads run past businesses, gas stations, ATMs, parking garages, transit stops, and city traffic cameras. We send preservation letters to every nearby business within days of intake. Most commercial video is on a 30- to 90-day overwrite. Cyclist helmet cameras and rear-facing bike cameras are increasingly common — preserve them immediately.
The driver's vehicle. Modern vehicles' airbag control modules record speed, brake application, and throttle position for the seconds before deployment. Where a reconstructionist is retained, we download that data. We also photograph and measure the vehicle's damage profile — paint transfer, hood damage, windshield strike pattern — which tells us where the cyclist was relative to the vehicle at impact.
Scene reconstruction. Lane widths, sight distances, signal timing, posted limits, and any obstructions. For right-hook and left-cross cases, signal-phase data from the city traffic department is critical.
The bicycle. Preserve it. Don't repair it. The damage to the bicycle — frame deformation, wheel position, paint marks — tells the same impact story the vehicle does, from the other side.
Witnesses. Motorists in adjacent lanes, pedestrians, business owners with a view of the intersection. Memories fade; we canvass early.
Insurance coverage. The at-fault driver's liability policy. The cyclist's own UM/UIM auto coverage may apply even though the cyclist was not in a car — Texas UM/UIM policies generally cover the insured while a pedestrian or cyclist struck by an uninsured or underinsured vehicle. Resident-relative auto policies. Employer policies if the driver was working. Umbrella coverage.
Experts. Accident reconstructionists, biomechanical engineers (for serious head and spine injuries), and where appropriate human factors specialists who can address driver perception and reaction time.
Recoverable Damages in a Texas Bicycle Crash
Texas law allows a cyclist to recover the same categories of damages as any other personal injury plaintiff. What you can recover depends on what was lost.
Economic damages. Past and future medical expenses (subject to §41.0105 paid-or-incurred), past and future lost wages, loss of earning capacity, attendant care, household services, home modifications, and out-of-pocket costs. The bicycle itself is property damage. High-end road and gravel bikes can run several thousand dollars; even commuter bikes are usually a four-figure replacement cost. Cycling-specific gear — helmet, kit, shoes, computer — is recoverable property damage.
Non-economic damages. Pain and mental anguish, physical impairment, disfigurement, and loss of enjoyment of life. Scarring from road rash and surgical hardware is compensable disfigurement. Loss of the ability to ride — and to participate in the cycling community that often defines a serious cyclist's social life — is real loss-of-enjoyment evidence we develop with our clients.
Exemplary damages. Available under §41.003 and §41.008 where the driver's conduct rises to gross negligence. Drunk drivers, road-rage incidents, and drivers who deliberately harassed the cyclist before the crash are the most common patterns.
Wrongful death. When a cyclist is killed, surviving spouses, children, and parents have a Chapter 71 wrongful death claim, alongside a separate survival action for the cyclist's pre-death damages.
What To Do After a Texas Bicycle Crash
The actions taken in the first hours after a crash often decide what the case is worth. Here is the playbook.
Accept emergency medical care. Head, neck, chest, and abdominal trauma can be subtle initially. Get the ER work-up. Adrenaline hides pain.
Photograph everything if you safely can. The scene, the driver's vehicle, your bicycle, your gear, your injuries, the lane width, the lighting. If you cannot, ask a witness or family member to do it before the scene is cleared.
Get witness contact information. Names, phone numbers, what they saw.
Preserve the bicycle and the helmet. Do not repair, replace, or throw away. The bicycle is evidence. So is the helmet — a cracked helmet is powerful proof of impact force.
Get the CR-3. The Texas Peace Officer's Crash Report is typically available on the TxDOT C.R.I.S. portal in 7 to 10 days. Audit it. Officers sometimes get the diagram wrong.
Preserve any helmet, handlebar, or rear-facing camera footage immediately. Pull the SD card. Make backups.
Do not give a recorded statement to the at-fault driver's insurance carrier. Politely decline. Do not sign medical authorizations.
Call Patterson Law Group. Free consultation. Contingency fee. (817) 784-2000. Offices in Fort Worth, Arlington, and San Antonio. Se Habla Español.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do cyclists have the same rights as cars in Texas?
Yes. Texas Transportation Code §551.101 gives cyclists the same rights and duties as drivers of motor vehicles on public roads. That includes the right to use a full lane when safety requires it, the right to be passed at a safe distance, and the right to recover damages when a negligent driver causes a crash.
Can I recover if I wasn't wearing a helmet?
Yes. Texas does not require adult cyclists to wear helmets, and helmet status is not an automatic defense even when local ordinances apply to children. Under comparative fault, the question is whether the lack of a helmet actually contributed to your injuries — and many bicycle injuries are unrelated to head impact.
What if the driver claims they didn't see me?
That's negligence. Texas drivers have a legal duty to keep a proper lookout and to yield to traffic with the right of way, including bicycles. 'I didn't see them' is a confession of inattention, not a defense.
How long do I have to file a bike accident case in Texas?
Two years from the date of the crash under CPRC §16.003. Cases involving road-design or maintenance defects on public roads can involve government claims with much shorter notice deadlines (as little as six months) — move quickly.
What damages can I recover after a Texas bicycle accident?
Past and future medical bills, lost wages and earning capacity, pain and suffering, mental anguish, physical impairment, disfigurement, and in cases of gross negligence (such as a drunk driver), exemplary damages. We also pursue property damage for the bike and gear.
Are Texas bicyclists treated as vehicles or pedestrians?
Under Texas Transportation Code §551, bicyclists have the same rights and duties as drivers of vehicles. They must ride with traffic, signal turns, and obey traffic-control devices. This cuts both ways: cyclists get vehicle-equivalent right-of-way protection AND are subject to vehicle-equivalent contributory fault analysis. We work the right-of-way carefully.
Does the at-fault driver's auto policy cover hitting a cyclist?
Yes — Texas auto liability policies cover bodily injury and property damage to cyclists struck by the insured vehicle. Where the at-fault driver has minimum policy limits ($30,000/$60,000), the recovery is capped at the limits unless we find additional defendants (the driver's employer if on-the-job, an alcohol provider in dram-shop cases, etc.). UM/UIM on the cyclist's OWN auto policy often applies.
What evidence is preserved in a Texas bicycle accident case?
The bike — before it is repaired, scrapped, or moved. Helmet and gear, photographed for impact evidence. Cyclometer or Strava data if the cyclist was using either, which can establish speed and route. Traffic-cam, dash-cam, and any cyclist-helmet-cam footage. The crash report and 911 audio. Cell phone records of the at-fault driver to establish distracted driving. A preservation letter is the standard tool to lock down this evidence early in the case.
What injuries are most common in Texas bicycle accident cases?
Traumatic brain injury (helmets reduce but do not eliminate the risk), clavicle fracture, wrist and forearm fractures from instinctive bracing, hip and femur fractures, road rash, and dental damage. Spinal cord injury is rarer but catastrophic when it occurs. A full neurology consult is often appropriate even where the cyclist does not lose consciousness, because TBI symptoms can develop over weeks.
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