Understanding Dooring Accidents

Dooring is kind of a funny name, for a very real accident, and one that we can all relate to.

As the name suggests, it’s when someone–usually a pedestrian or a bike rider, but it may be another car driver as well–is hit by someone opening their (usually parked) car door, or leaving their car door open, and thus, hitting the person walking or biking or even on a motorcycle.

How the Accidents Happen

It’s common sense and we all know that when you open your car door it sticks out–often into pathways and walkways and roadways. And yet, many people, once their car is stationary, will just open their door, without looking to see if there is oncoming traffic of any kind, and may even leave the car door open for extended periods of time as they load or unload their cars.

As you can imagine, dooring is more frequent in more crowded cities, where cars are cramped into small spaces, or where they are parallel parked in a way that the open door juts out into other traffic or cyclists.

Many more modern cars have warning systems, but those warning systems are for the people in the car, warning them to not open the door because there is a car or cyclist outside–obviously those systems don’t warn the actual victims, outside the vehicle. And while they can be effective, not every car has them. The fact that the technology exists in the first place should tell you how common these kinds of accidents are becoming.

Difficulties in Dooring Cases

These accidents can be frustrating for a number of reasons.

In a number of more crowded urban areas, drivers may feel that they had no choice–that the area where the car was parked is so crowded, or is so close to oncoming traffic, that there is no way to safely open the door just to get out of the car. Drivers may rightfully believe that they have every right to open their car door to get out of their own vehicle.

Of course, there are no traffic signals telling people when to open their door. That means that when dooring accidents happen, they can often become “he said/she said” affairs, with both the dooring victim and the car driver, blaming each other for not looking, not slowing down, or for generally being careless.

A Tough Choice

It’s easy to blame a victim for seeing a car door open, and running into it anyway. That’s because of the other choice–if the cyclist or pedestrian or other driver would try to avoid the open car door, he or she may then have to veer off into open traffic lanes, or some other hazards; the choice may be crash into the open door, or veer off the road or into traffic.

Contact our Rhode Island car accident lawyers at Robert E. Craven & Associates at 401-453-2700 for help in your dooring accident.