Struck while crossing outside a crosswalk

One word does most of the damage in these claims. An adjuster says "jaywalking," everyone assumes that settles it, and a person with a real claim walks away. The statute says something considerably more balanced. This is general information, not legal advice.

Check whether you were actually outside a crosswalk

Before anything else. An unmarked crosswalk exists at most intersections — the notional continuation of the sidewalk across the road — and a pedestrian crossing there is in a crosswalk as a matter of law, paint or no paint. Claims are routinely mislabelled on this point.

If you were crossing at or near a corner, read crosswalk accidents first. This page is for genuine mid-block crossings.

What section 21954 requires — both halves

Subdivision (a): every pedestrian upon a roadway at any point other than within a marked crosswalk or within an unmarked crosswalk at an intersection shall yield the right of way to all vehicles upon the roadway so near as to constitute an immediate hazard.

Subdivision (b): the provisions of this section shall not relieve the driver of a vehicle from the duty to exercise due care for the safety of any pedestrian upon a roadway.

Read them together and the picture changes. The yield duty is real and it is narrow — it applies to vehicles so near as to constitute an immediate hazard, not to every vehicle on the road. And whatever the pedestrian did, the driver's duty of care survives it. A driver who had time to see and avoid someone in the road and did not is responsible for that failure regardless of where the person was crossing.

Sources: Veh. Code, § 21954 (pedestrian's yield duty outside a crosswalk; subd. (b) preserves the driver's duty of due care). Last amended Stats. 2022, ch. 957 (AB 2147), effective January 1, 2023 — within the last three years. CACI No. 700 (a driver must keep a lookout and control the speed and movement of the vehicle), Judicial Council of California Civil Jury Instructions (2026 edition).

The Freedom to Walk Act

AB 2147, effective January 1, 2023, changed how these rules are enforced. It limited when an officer may stop or cite a pedestrian for crossing outside a crosswalk where the crossing did not create an immediate hazard. The same legislation touched several related sections, including the crosswalk provision.

What it did not do is repeal the yield duty in subdivision (a) or change the civil analysis. It is worth knowing for two reasons: the absence of a citation is no longer evidence that a crossing was lawful, and the legislative direction of travel is toward treating mid-block crossing as ordinary behaviour to be accommodated rather than punished.

How "jaywalking" gets used

It functions as a conversation-ender. It is not a term the Vehicle Code uses, it does not describe a strict liability offence, and it does not answer the questions that decide the claim:

• Was the vehicle so near as to constitute an immediate hazard when the crossing began?
• Could the driver have seen the pedestrian in time?
• Was the driver's speed reasonable for a road where people cross?
• Did the driver brake at all?
• How far was the nearest controlled crossing?
• What were the lighting and sight lines?

Even where a pedestrian did breach the yield duty, that is a percentage. California reduces a recovery by the claimant's share with no cutoff — see comparative fault and what if I was partly at fault.

When the road is the reason

Some corridors have long distances between controlled crossings, transit stops that discharge passengers where nobody can legally cross, and lighting that makes a pedestrian invisible until it is too late. Where the roadway design is part of the cause, a claim against the public entity responsible may exist alongside the claim against the driver — on a much shorter deadline.

Claims against a government entity · older adults, where crossing distance and signal timing matter most.

Common questions

If I was not in a crosswalk, do I still have a claim?

Usually yes. Section 21954 requires a pedestrian outside a crosswalk to yield to vehicles so near as to constitute an immediate hazard — and then says in terms that this does not relieve the driver of the duty to exercise due care for the safety of any pedestrian on the roadway. Both halves are the law.

Is jaywalking still illegal in California?

The Freedom to Walk Act, effective in 2023, limited when an officer may stop or cite a pedestrian for crossing outside a crosswalk where no immediate hazard exists. It changed enforcement. It did not repeal the yield duty, and it did not make crossing anywhere automatically safe or automatically lawful.

The insurer says I was jaywalking so there is no claim. Is that right?

No. Even where a pedestrian breached the yield duty, that is a share of fault rather than a bar, and California reduces a recovery by the claimant’s percentage without any cutoff. The word "jaywalking" is doing rhetorical work that the statute does not support.

What if there was no crosswalk anywhere near?

Long blocks without a crossing are common and courts and juries understand that. The distance to the nearest controlled crossing, and whether the road was designed in a way that makes crossing mid-block inevitable, are both relevant to how fault is apportioned.