Motorcycle Accidents
You have the same rights as any other road user, and Texas has no motorcycle exception to them. The real obstacle is bias: adjusters and juries assume the rider was speeding or reckless. Helmet use is not a defense to your claim, and riders over 21 with training or insurance may lawfully ride without one.
The single most common serious motorcycle crash is a car turning left across an oncoming rider’s path. The driver almost always says the same thing: I never saw the motorcycle.
That is an admission, not a defense. A driver turning left must yield to oncoming traffic close enough to be a hazard, and not seeing a lawfully approaching vehicle is a failure to keep a proper lookout.
The dispute then moves to speed, because speed is the only way to shift blame back. That is answered with scene evidence — sight lines, skid and scuff marks, vehicle damage geometry, and where available the car’s own event data recorder.
Texas requires a helmet unless the rider is at least 21 and has either completed an approved safety course or carries qualifying health coverage.
More importantly, the statute provides that not wearing one is not admissible to prove negligence or to reduce recovery. It is legally irrelevant to fault.
It gets raised regardless, informally, in how a file is valued and how a story is told. The answer is the statute, applied early and firmly.
There is no cage, no crumple zone and no airbag. The same impact that bruises a driver breaks a rider: orthopedic injury, degloving, spinal damage and traumatic brain injury are ordinary outcomes rather than extreme ones.
The at-fault driver still carries only the Texas minimum of $30,000 per person in many cases. So the question of what other coverage exists — your own uninsured and underinsured motorist coverage above all — is usually what determines whether the claim can meet the medical bills.
Check your own policy early. UM/UIM is included unless you rejected it in writing, and it is the coverage riders most often do not realize they have.
Texas has not authorized lane splitting. A rider is entitled to the full width of a lane, and a driver may not crowd a motorcycle out of it.
Two riders may lawfully ride abreast in a single lane. Neither of those facts stops an insurer arguing the rider was somewhere they should not have been, so the physical evidence of lane position matters.
Get treated and be examined for head injury even if you were wearing a helmet and feel clear. Riders routinely underestimate concussion.
Do not let the bike be repaired or scrapped. It is evidence, and its damage pattern is often what establishes the geometry of the impact.
Photograph the scene, the sight lines from the driver’s position, and the gear you were wearing.
Check your own policy for UM/UIM and PIP before assuming the other driver’s limits are all there is.
No. The statute says helmet use is not admissible to prove negligence or to reduce recovery, and riders over 21 with a safety course or qualifying coverage may ride without one lawfully.
It is closer to an admission. A driver turning left must yield to oncoming traffic, and failing to see a lawfully approaching motorcycle is a failure to keep a proper lookout.
No, Texas has not authorized it. A rider is entitled to a full lane, and two riders may lawfully ride abreast within one.
Look to your own uninsured and underinsured motorist coverage. It is on your policy unless you rejected it in writing, and in serious rider injuries it is frequently the largest available source.
Two years from the crash.
Automated intake assistant. It does not give legal advice and using it does not create an attorney–client relationship.