Bicycle Accident Lawyer in Century City

The Gap Between the Plan and the Paint

This is worth understanding, because it is not an abstraction.

Santa Monica Boulevard is designated Tier 1, Protected Bicycle Lanes, on the city's adopted Bicycle Enhanced Network. What is on the ground is paint, installed in 2007 and 2019. Avenue of the Stars is listed on the Bicycle Lane Network and has no facility at all, on a street the city's own mobility plan classifies as a Boulevard II with an eighty-foot roadway and designates a scenic highway for its landscaped median.

Los Angeles voters passed Measure HLA in March 2024, effective that April, adding section 85.11 to the municipal code. It requires the city to install the mobility plan's designated elements when it does qualifying street work, and for a Tier 1 street on the Bicycle Enhanced Network the standard element is a Class IV protected lane. The obligation now exists on paper for Santa Monica Boulevard. It has not changed what is painted there.

None of this decides a case on its own. It does mean that a cyclist riding Century City's main streets is, in most of the district, riding in mixed traffic by default rather than by choice, and that is directly relevant when a driver's insurer suggests the rider should have been somewhere else.

Construction Around the Metro Station

Century City is in the middle of a multi-year Metro D Line extension. Tunnelling finished in April 2024, and the current work is station finishing, deck removal, backfill and utilities, which is the phase that affects street level most.

As of September 2026 that means real changes to the road. The north sidewalk of Constellation Boulevard is closed for a six-month period running from May to November. Waterline work on Avenue of the Stars between mid-September and mid-October 2026 brings lane and turn-pocket closures. Station work runs twenty-four hours a day Monday to Saturday, with staging yards along Century Park East, and a separate private construction site sits at the northeast corner of Constellation and Avenue of the Stars.

Construction zones move cyclists into traffic, change sight lines, and put plates, gravel and lane shifts where a rider does not expect them. When a crash happens in or near one, who controlled that zone and what the traffic control plan required become live questions. The Century City station is expected to open in spring 2027, so these conditions will be there for a while.

One thing the district does not have is bike share. Metro Bike Share does not serve Century City; the nearest station is about a mile and a half away near Westwood.

The Rules That Decide Fault

A Cyclist Has the Rights and Duties of a Driver

Vehicle Code section 21200 puts a person riding a bicycle on the roadway under the same provisions, with the same rights and the same duties, as the driver of a vehicle. That cuts both ways, and it is the starting point for every argument about fault.

Where You Are Allowed to Ride

Section 21202 requires a cyclist traveling slower than traffic to keep as near the right-hand edge as practicable, and then lists the situations where that does not apply, including passing, preparing to turn left, avoiding hazards, and lanes too narrow to share safely side by side. That last exception matters more than people realize, because a great many lanes are too narrow to share safely.

Passing, and What AB 1909 Changed

Section 21760, the Three Feet for Safety Act, requires a driver overtaking a cyclist to pass at a safe distance of not less than three feet. The 2023 amendment went further: where practicable, a driver must move into an adjacent lane to pass, and where that is not possible must slow to a reasonable and prudent speed and pass only when it will not endanger the cyclist. A driver who squeezed past without changing lanes has a harder position than they used to.

Dooring

Section 22517 makes it unlawful to open a vehicle door on the traffic side unless it is reasonably safe to do so, and it requires the door not be left open longer than necessary to load or unload. In a district built around valet lanes, garage entrances and curbside pick-up, this is not a marginal scenario.

Helmets, Stated Honestly

California requires a helmet for riders under eighteen, under section 21212. There is no requirement for adults. Whether an adult's decision not to wear one can be used to reduce damages is not settled by any published California appellate decision, and the section itself says nothing about civil liability. Expect an insurer to raise it anyway; treat anyone who tells you the answer is definitely yes or definitely no with some caution.

Partial Fault Does Not End a Claim

California reduces a recovery by the injured person's own share of responsibility rather than barring it outright. Being found partly at fault reduces what you recover; it does not remove the claim.

When the Road Itself Is the Problem

Where a pothole, a broken surface, a plate or a badly managed work zone contributed, the defendant may be a public entity, and that changes the deadline dramatically. A written claim is generally due within six months under Government Code section 911.2, not two years. The claim is brought under Government Code section 835, which requires a dangerous condition, causation, foreseeability, and either that a public employee created the condition or that the entity had notice of it with time to act.

Notice is where these cases are won or lost, and an entity's own inspection system becomes central.

Time Limits, and the Short One

Two years from the collision under Code of Civil Procedure section 335.1 against a private driver. Six months to present a claim if a public entity is in the case.

Century City personal injury cases go to the West District of Los Angeles Superior Court, at the Santa Monica or Beverly Hills courthouse, following the court's October 2022 move away from a central personal injury hub.

Legal Disclaimer

This page is provided by Etehad Law for general information only and is not legal advice. Reading it does not create an attorney-client relationship. The attorney responsible for this communication is Simon P. Etehad, Esq. (California State Bar No. 186449), Etehad Law, Beverly Hills, California. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome.