Florida Bicycle and Pedestrian Accident Lawyer

No airbag. No crumple zone. No steel door between you and a bumper moving at forty miles an hour. A pedestrian in a crosswalk and a cyclist in a bike lane follow the same rules as every car on the road, and when a driver breaks one of those rules, the person with the least protection pays the highest price. The police report calls it a vehicle versus pedestrian crash. That phrase does not describe what a trauma surgeon sees.

I am Louis P. Meyer, Esq., a Senior Attorney at Kanner & Pintaluga, P.A. in Tampa. My practice focuses on personal injury cases across Florida, including bicycle and pedestrian accident claims. This page covers how these cases work, because people on foot and on bikes sit in an unusual place in Florida insurance law: outside the car, but not outside the system, if you know where the coverage lives.

What this practice covers

Bicycle and pedestrian claims involve the full range of traffic injuries with none of the vehicle’s protection: fractures, head injuries, spinal injuries, internal trauma, and wrongful death. The crash patterns repeat across Tampa and Florida: drivers turning across crosswalks, right turns on red without a real stop, drivers exiting driveways and parking lots into people lawfully in front of them, distracted drivers drifting into bike lanes, and dooring incidents where a parked car’s door opens into a rider’s path.

I handle these claims across Florida: the liability investigation against the driver, the search for video and witnesses while they still exist, and the coverage work that decides what the claim is actually worth, because in pedestrian and bicycle cases the injured person’s own auto policy often matters as much as the driver’s. Hit and run cases get their own protocol, described below, because a driver who leaves the scene changes the claim without ending it.

The coverage lesson most people learn too late

Florida treats people struck by cars as part of the auto insurance system, which surprises nearly everyone. Your own personal injury protection, known as PIP, can pay first for your medical care when a motor vehicle strikes you while you are on foot or on a bicycle, provided you own an insured vehicle or live with a relative who does. The same deadline applies as in any vehicle crash: under Fla. Stat. § 627.736, initial medical care must be received within fourteen days of the accident or PIP pays nothing. Pedestrians lose that benefit every week simply because nobody told them the fourteen day clock applies to them too.

The second lesson is harder. Florida does not require drivers to carry bodily injury liability insurance, and many carry none. That is where uninsured and underinsured motorist coverage, known as UM and UIM, becomes the whole case: your own policy’s UM coverage steps in when the driver who hit you has too little or none, and it can apply when you were struck on foot or on a bike. A person hit while walking is often, without knowing it, insured by a policy sitting in a drawer at home. Mapping that coverage in the first weeks is not a detail. It is frequently the difference between a claim that pays for the injury and one that pays almost nothing.

How I approach this work

Video first, because businesses record over their footage on short cycles and the driver who hit you has no duty to save it. I work to secure surveillance and doorbell footage, identify witnesses beyond the police report, and document the scene’s lighting, markings, and sight lines before they change. Then fault gets proven carefully. Florida applies modified comparative fault under Fla. Stat. § 768.81, and carriers defending these cases argue the pedestrian was outside the crosswalk, the cyclist was hard to see, the person on foot was looking at a phone. Sometimes the facts support some of that; sometimes the argument is reflex, and the evidence defeats it. You will hear from me which one your case is, and the claim gets built on the record, not the report’s first draft.

Questions people ask after a Florida bicycle or pedestrian accident

Does PIP really cover me if I was walking or riding a bike?

It can. Florida’s personal injury protection system extends beyond car occupants: a pedestrian or bicyclist struck by a motor vehicle is generally covered by the PIP policy of a vehicle they own, or by the policy of a relative they live with. Under Fla. Stat. § 627.736, the fourteen day initial treatment rule applies the same way. If neither you nor a resident relative has a policy, the striking vehicle’s PIP may respond instead. Determining which policy applies is an early case task.

The driver who hit me has no insurance. Is there still a case?

Often yes, because of your own coverage. Uninsured motorist coverage on your auto policy can pay for your injuries when the at fault driver has no bodily injury insurance, and it generally follows you as a pedestrian or cyclist struck by a vehicle. The driver’s lack of insurance ends many cases people try to handle alone, and it should not end yours.

It was a hit and run and nobody got the plate. What can be done?

Report it to law enforcement immediately, get medical care within the fourteen day window, and photograph everything, including the scene and your injuries and damaged gear. Hit and run victims can frequently claim under their own uninsured motorist coverage, since a fleeing driver is treated as uninsured, but prompt reporting and corroborating evidence matter greatly. Nearby camera footage disappears quickly, so the first days decide what evidence the case will ever have.

I may have been partly outside the crosswalk. Does that end my claim?

Not usually. Under Fla. Stat. § 768.81, Florida reduces a recovery by your percentage of fault and bars recovery only if you are found more than fifty percent at fault. Being outside a crosswalk, crossing against a signal, or riding without lights at night can raise your share, and each fact matters. Drivers still owe duties of care to pedestrians and cyclists they can see, and a fault argument is an argument, not a conclusion.

Should I talk to the driver’s insurance company?

Carefully, and ideally not alone in the first weeks. The driver’s carrier will take a recorded statement while you are injured and uncertain about distances, signals, and speeds, and that statement becomes the standard your later accounts are measured against. Your own carrier is different, since your policy likely requires cooperation. Pedestrian and bicycle statements are especially sensitive because the injured person usually saw the least of what happened.

How long do I have to file a bicycle or pedestrian accident lawsuit in Florida?

For most negligence cases, Florida law allows two years from the date of the accident to file suit. Claims against government entities, which can arise where road design, signage, or a government vehicle is involved, carry special presuit notice rules and shorter timelines. The evidence deadlines are the urgent ones: video cycles in days, and witnesses are strangers who vanish.

The bottom line

A pedestrian or bicycle claim is won on two things most victims do not know they have: video that will not exist in a month, and coverage that was sitting in their own insurance policy the whole time. The driver’s story gets told to the adjuster first. The evidence and the policy language are how the other side of the story gets told at all.

Louis P. Meyer, Esq.
Senior Attorney, Kanner & Pintaluga, P.A.
100 S. Ashley Drive, Suite 610, Tampa, FL 33602
Phone: 561-206-2949
Email: lmeyer@kpattorney.com

About the Author

Louis P. Meyer, Esq. is a Senior Attorney at Kanner & Pintaluga, P.A., where his practice focuses on personal injury cases and first party property damage claims across Florida, including bicycle and pedestrian accident claims. He was selected to Florida Rising Stars in 2024, 2025, and 2026. He is bilingual in English and Spanish, writes the LouisTheLawyer publication on Substack, and hosts the podcast Off The Record by Louis Meyer. He holds an LL.M. from the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at Arizona State University, a J.D. from Whittier Law School, and a B.A. from UCLA, graduating with Honors. He was admitted to The Florida Bar on November 23, 2020, Bar No. 1024811. This page is general information about how bicycle and pedestrian accident claims work in Florida. It is not legal advice about any specific accident or injury.

Louis P. Meyer, Esq., Senior Attorney, Kanner & Pintaluga, P.A., 100 S. Ashley Drive, Suite 610, Tampa, FL 33602. Phone: 561-206-2949. Email: lmeyer@kpattorney.com.

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