When Broken or Uneven Sidewalks Cause An Injury | New York Injury Law

A person is walking down a Staten Island sidewalk and trips on a severely uneven or broken sidewalk and injures themselves pretty severely. An ambulance is called by the injured person or a bystander and the person is taken to the emergency room. The doctor at the ER and the doctors the person follows up with say that the injuries are a broken wrist and also injuries to the hip and back. 

Similar to the situation above a person could be walking down a sidewalk in Brooklyn during the winter time. It snowed two days before and some of the snow had melted the day before and froze overnight now creating a very slick pathway. A person slips and falls on the icy sidewalk and sustains torn ligaments in their arm and injuries to their knee along with a few other cuts and bruises.

Both situations leave the injured person more than likely missing time from work and with some unwanted medical bills and possibly conditions that can alter their lifestyle or leave them in pain the rest of their life. When injuries are foreseeable to be permanent it is important to understand the New York laws for a sidewalk injury. In both of the above situations, depending on if the property where the accident occurred was private property or if it was public property, are negligent situations. If the property was a private property in New York the lawsuit would more than likely be against the homeowner where the slip and fall accident occurred. If the slip and fall accident occurred on a public property area the negligence would be held against the City of New York if the slip and fall occurred in Staten Island, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Queens or the Bronx. 

Homeowners, store owners and the City of New York all have the responsibility of keeping their property safe from dangers that can be considered negligent. In situations where the pavement is extremely uneven, broken or icy it can create an area that is just waiting for an accident to happen. Ignoring the problem once it is noticed and realized that it is dangerous is considered negligence. The matter may also be considered negligence if it was a reasonable amount of time for the person or city to realize that is was a dangerous such as the situation with the person who falls on an icy sidewalk. In New York there are laws describing how long you have to shovel snow off of your sidewalk. If the snow is not shoveled in this reasonable amount of time put in place by New York law and a person gets injured as a direct result of it they may be responsible for negligence and in turn may have a lawsuit filed against them. 

Each situation involving premises liability such as sidewalk injuries must be evaluated on a one by one basis because each situation and scenario is unique. For a free review of your New York City sidewalk injury accident call our Staten Island injury law firm at 718.979.4300 or email us.