blog | Lane Brown, LLC

Millions of people travel through Chicago every day. Due in part to the traffic congestion our city suffers, we see countless car accidents every year.

Some intersections are much more dangerous than others. Continue reading to learn more about hazardous Chicago intersections and which roads you should be extra careful on.

What Makes One Intersection More Hazardous Than Another?

Many factors can make an intersection dangerous. Some of the most common traits of a risky intersection include the following:

Poor lighting
Missing street signs
Lack of crosswalks
No bicycle lanes
Too many lanes of traffic
Missing traffic lights
Distracted, drowsy, and drunk drivers

You’ll want to be especially cautious when you are traveling through an intersection that has any of the above risks. Don’t be another statistic—make sure that when you are driving through a dangerous intersection, you are doing everything you can to drive safely.

High Fatality and Crash Rates in These Cross Streets

The following intersections are known to be risky for Chicago drivers. Many crashes in these areas result in death, and victims lucky enough to survive often suffer serious injuries. If you’ve been injured in any of these cross streets or another intersection in Chicago, contact a qualified auto accident lawyer to discuss the details of your case.

Stony Island and South Chicago Avenue

Situated directly below the exit and entry ramps of the Chicago Skyway, this intersection is difficult to navigate partly because the beams of the Skyway obstructing the view of drivers. Traffic lights and street signs are difficult to read at this six-way intersection. There are crosswalks encircling the intersection but no lanes for bikers.

North Damen and Milwaukee

With five roads converging at this intersection, the intersection of North Damen and Milwaukee is heavily populated by restaurants, banks, gyms, and various retail shops. The area does have bike lanes, but bicyclists often ignore these, as well as the traffic signals.

Irving Park, Cicero, and Milwaukee

Portage Park is home to this six-corners intersection. Surrounded by shopping centers and side streets that allow additional traffic to congest the intersection, the intersection of Cicero and Milwaukee at Irving Park has up to four lanes of traffic, off-street parking, bus stops, and no lanes of traffic for bikers. It does have crosswalks across and between every road, however.

Belmont and Kedzie Avenue

The intersection of Belmont and Kedzie avenues is infamous for being dangerous. Not only is it directly underneath the Kennedy Expressway, with barriers often blocking the view of drivers who need to make a turn, but the lighting in the underpass is minimal, making it hard for drivers to see anything at all. This is a problem when there is a constant stream of vehicles pulling off of the Expressway.

Western and Peterson Avenue

This intersection is dangerous due to the up to four lanes of traffic on either side of the road. Also, there are multiple car dealerships here—full of people shakily test driving potential purchases. Crosswalks line all four sides of the intersection, although there are no lanes for bike riders. Street signs here can also be difficult to read.

Speak with a Chicago Car Accident Lawyer

If you have suffered an auto injury in any of these intersections or another dangerous area, get in touch with an experienced Chicago car accident lawyer at Lane Brown, LLC today.

Our firm will work tirelessly to secure the compensation you need to cover your losses. We provide free consultations to prospective clients. Schedule yours by calling our office at 312-332-1400 or completing the contact form below.

There are thousands of car accidents across Illinois every day. One of the most common culprits in the cause of these collisions is distracted driving. This occurs when a driver is distracted by something that takes his or her focus off of the road.

Common distractions include cell phones, navigation systems, searching for something, other passengers, stereo systems, dropping an item, eating, drinking, and anything else that diverts your attention from driving safely.

Risk of Injury to Others

It’s one thing to warn of the risks of distracted driving, but understanding how truly dangerous distracted driving can be is another thing. This error in driving can cause tremendous injury to those involved in a resulting crash.

Those who choose to drive distracted can cause traumatic brain injuries, spinal cord injuries, limb loss, and permanent disfigurement to individuals involved in the accident. The impact this can have on not only your life but the lives of bystanders and other motorists can be life-changing.

You don’t want to be the cause of someone losing his or her ability to walk or complete daily tasks. When you’re driving, make sure your attention is fully focused on driving safely so you don’t cause harm to yourself or someone else. The distraction simply isn’t worth the risk.

Liability for Injuries

In addition to causing severe injury to others, driving while distracted opens perpetrators up to lawsuits from victims. They could end up being responsible for any costs associated with the injuries they cause, including medical bills and equipment, pain and suffering, emotional distress, loss of income and future earning potential, and loss of enjoyment of life.

These damages can quickly add up. And unless the distracted driver is prepared to write a check for tens of thousands of dollars, a personal injury lawsuit can quickly leave him or her in dire financial straits for the devastation he or she has caused.

Distracted drivers could also be subject to criminal charges, fines, and driver license suspension, which could impact their ability to work. All drivers have an obligation to drive safely so the lives of others aren’t at risk.

Text messages and that bottle of water that rolled under the seat can wait. Focusing your attention on the road—where it should be—is in your best interest and simply a responsible driving practice.

Speak with a Chicago Car Accident Lawyer

If you’ve been injured in a motor vehicle accident and believe distracted driving might have played a role in the crash, contact a Chicago car accident lawyer at Lane Brown, LLC. Our experienced attorneys can thoroughly investigate your collision to determine whether distracted driving is to blame. If it was, we can hold the driver accountable to make sure you’re fairly compensated.

Schedule a free, no-obligation case evaluation today by calling 312-332-1400 or filling out the contact form we have provided at the bottom of this page.

Construction work sites are among the most dangerous places to work. As a result, accidents at construction sites are a fairly common occurrence. Although safety is always part of the equation on any job site, sometimes injuries and deaths happen.

An injury or death is always sure to raise legal issues as construction employees seek to protect their financial health until they can recover or to protect themselves for a longer term if they cannot. A construction accident lawyer is a necessity going forward in these types of cases.

The biggest issue facing an attorney is where to affix blame for the construction accident. Because job sites can be large and complicated affairs, it’s not always easy to affix blame, especially when many parties are involved.

As part of due diligence in a case, an attorney will seek to clarify job responsibilities of everyone involved in a construction project.

A construction site owner may or may not give over total control to an independent contractor, and so a landowner may or may not be considered the legal possessor of the land during a construction project. That means whoever is in legal possession of the land is liable for potentially harmful conditions, if they exist.

General and sub-contractors have a duty to keep a construction site reasonably safe and to warn of any dangerous conditions that exist as well as making sure all safety regulations are being followed.

Architects and engineers may also bear responsibility, depending on their level of active involvement with a job site. They are held to professional standards during the design and construction phases of a project, and if those standards are violated, resulting in an injury, they can be held liable.

The Law Offices of Lane Brown proudly serve the city of Chicago and the surrounding communities.

As a consumer, if you feel you are the victim of a product or service that caused you emotional, financial or physical harm, you may want to seek compensation through legal means.

A product liability lawyer has many possible legal arguments on which to base a case and help you recover damages.

Negligence – To recover damages using an argument of negligence, a plaintiff’s attorney must prove five elements:

The manufacturer owed a duty to the plaintiff
The manufacturer breached that duty
That breach was the actual cause of the plaintiff’s injury
The breach was also the proximate cause of the injury
The plaintiff actually suffered damages as a result of the negligence

False or Misleading information – A claim can also be filed based on misleading information conveyed by the manufacturer of a product. If a person relies on that information and is injured as a result, then the defendant can be sued based on the misinformation only, whether or not the product was deficient.

Warranty – A warranty is a guarantee a seller gives regarding the quality of a product. If the product’s quality is less than what is represented, the seller could be in breach of the warranty.

Strict Liability – Under Section 402A of the Restatement of Torts, a manufacturer is liable for product defects that take place during the manufacturing process. This has also been extended to include cases that do not include manufacturing, but instead involve a failure of a manufacturer to provide ample warnings.

On the other hand, a product liability suit may be defended by the claim that a plaintiff used a product in a way other than how it was originally intended to be used or that the plaintiff was negligent in how they used a product.

Product liability can be complicated on either side of a case, and it’s best to consult an attorney early on if you are involved in one of these situations.

The Law Offices of Lane Brown proudly serve the city of Chicago and the surrounding communities.

Since 1908, when Congress passed the Federal Employers Liability Act, railroad workers have enjoyed protection in the form of legal recovery if they are injured on the job.

Almost all types of railroad jobs are covered, even those jobs that are not directly around trains. Claims by a railroad accident lawyer can be brought against any railroad employer or as a suit in state or federal courts.

Under FELA, a worker who brings a claim against an employer must establish fault, proving negligence, in order to win a suit. That’s why it is important to understand the legal rights and responsibilities in attempting to receive compensation.

Railroad companies have a number of responsibilities to employees under FELA. They must:

Provide a safe working environment, tools and safety devices.
Ensure adequate training takes place.
Make sure that there is enough supervision and assistance for workers to do their jobs.
Enforce safety rules and regulations.
Make sure working conditions are free of hazards and free from intentional, harmful acts of other people.

In other instances where negligence needs to be established to win a claim, the burden of proof can be much higher than in a suit covered by FELA. FELA claimants only need to show that negligence, no matter how small, played a part in the worker’s accident. This is sometimes known as a “featherweight” burden of proof.

If a worker wins a FELA suit, they can expect to be compensated for past and future wage losses, past and future medical treatments, and past and future pain, suffering and mental anguish. In the event of a railroad employee death, a spouse and children can collect damages instead.

In most cases, FELA suits rarely go to trial. They usually end in mediation and settlement conferences that are ordered by the court.

The Law Offices of Lane Brown, LLC proudly serve the city of Chicago and the surrounding communities.

When a person dies due to another person’s wrongful or negligent acts, that sets the stage for a wrongful death claim to be filed. A wrongful death attorney will need to prove four main elements in a case to allow the family of the deceased to be able to collect damages.

Duty – To be found liable, a defendant must have owed the deceased a duty of due care. Due care will vary from case to case, but essentially it means that one individual had the responsibility to keep another person safe, or not to do something that would bring harm to the other person. A judge will determine if due care was exercised, taking into account how predictable the possible harm was to the person, what the standard is by examining similar cases and how closely the defendant’s acts were to the harm that caused the injured party’s death.

Breach of Duty – If due care was proven to exist, then the plaintiff must prove that the defendant’s actions actually caused the deceased death through a breach of duty. If other words, if the defendant was in a position to protect the deceased, and through their actions or lack of actions, they did not, they could be cited for breach of duty.

Causation – If a breach of duty exists, then it must be shown that the breach actually caused the deceased harm. This can be complex because often times, multiple actions and people are involved and sorting out an exact cause, making it very complicated.

Damages – When the other elements are proven, then all that remains is to prove that the deceased actually suffered damages. In a wrongful death, because the person was killed, it is always presumed that damages exist.

The Law Offices of Lane Brown proudly serve the city of Chicago and the surrounding communities.