Jackson Heights Personal Injury Lawyer

What the city found on Northern Boulevard

Start here, because it is the most useful thing anyone can tell you about being hit by a car in this neighborhood.

New York City’s transportation department studied the two-mile stretch of Northern Boulevard running from 71st Street to 112th Street — the full Jackson Heights frontage — and presented what it found to Queens Community Board 3. On that stretch, 27 people had been killed or severely injured, and six pedestrians had died since 2013. The department expanded its safety work after four pedestrians were killed in a single year.

Then this, which is the part worth holding onto:

62 percent of the pedestrian crashes involved somebody who was crossing with the signal. The Queens average is 34 percent. On Northern Boulevard, nearly two in three of the people struck had the walk.

The first thing an insurer says after a pedestrian knockdown is that you stepped out, or that you were not looking. On this road, on the city’s own figures, most of the people who were hit were doing exactly what they were told to do. That is not an opinion, and it is not something we made up for a website. It is the transportation department’s own count, presented to your own community board.

Where Jackson Heights accidents happen

The city designates its most dangerous streets as Vision Zero priority corridors. In Jackson Heights that list is long and it covers almost every road you would actually use: Roosevelt Avenue, Northern Boulevard, 37th Avenue, Junction Boulevard, Broadway, and 75th, 79th and 81st Streets. 69th Street is designated north of Roosevelt Avenue.

The city also names individual junctions. The priority intersections here are 90th Street at Northern Boulevard, 75th Street at Roosevelt Avenue, and 37th Avenue at both 81st and 84th Streets.

Across the neighborhood in 2025 there were 734 reported crashes, in which 391 people were injured and one was killed. Of those injured, 97 were on foot and 44 were on a bicycle. One of the deaths was a pedestrian.

Roosevelt Avenue deserves its own sentence. It carries the elevated 7 line overhead, which means support columns in the roadway, shadow, and a constant crowd at the station stairs. The columns block sight lines in both directions — a driver cannot see a person stepping out from behind one, and a person cannot see the car.

Northern Boulevard is the opposite problem. It is wide, it is fast, and drivers treat it as a through road rather than a street where people live.

34th Avenue is the exception that proves the rule. It is now Paseo Park, the city’s first permanent open street, running from 69th Street to 96th Street with 90 million dollars committed to building it out properly. It is the one east-west road here that is not on the danger list.

The Brooklyn-Queens Expressway runs along the western edge and the Grand Central Parkway along the north. The merges on and off both produce a steady run of rear-end and sideswipe collisions.

The claims we handle in Jackson Heights

Most of what comes to us from this neighborhood falls into a handful of categories, and nearly all of them trace back to the same few roads.

• Pedestrian knockdowns on Roosevelt Avenue, Northern Boulevard and 37th Avenue — the largest single category here, and the one where the city’s own data helps most.
• Car accidents on Northern Boulevard, Junction Boulevard and the BQE and Grand Central approaches.
• Slip and fall claims in the shops, restaurants and apartment buildings along 37th Avenue and Roosevelt Avenue, and on the sidewalks outside them.
• E-bike, e-scooter and delivery-rider collisions, which are dense here because the restaurant strip is dense.
• Bus and commercial vehicle crashes. Where an MTA bus or a city vehicle is involved, a notice of claim has to be filed within 90 days rather than three years.
• Construction accidents, which in New York carry protections most workers do not know they have — including protections that apply regardless of immigration status or whether you were paid off the books.
• Hit and run cases, where the driver leaves and you are told nothing can be done. Usually something can.
• Premises liability, where an owner knew something was dangerous and left it that way.

If you are not sure which of these describes your situation, that is normal. It is usually the first thing we work out on the call.

Where you were treated matters more than you would think

The nearest hospital to Jackson Heights is NYC Health + Hospitals/Elmhurst, on Broadway, about a mile away. It is the closest Level I trauma center and it is where most serious injuries from these corridors are taken.

It is also a city hospital. That matters, because a claim arising from care at a public hospital has to begin with a notice of claim within 90 days — not three years. People routinely lose the right to bring that part of a case without ever knowing the deadline existed.

The private hospitals nearby follow the ordinary rules. Mount Sinai Queens in Astoria and Long Island Jewish Forest Hills are both private not-for-profits; neither is a state-designated trauma center. NewYork-Presbyterian Queens in Flushing is private and is a Level I trauma center.

So the question is not only what happened to you. It is which ambulance took you where. Bring the paperwork to your first appointment — those records usually decide what a claim is worth.

Sidewalk falls in Jackson Heights are a special case

Since 2003 New York City has put responsibility for most sidewalks on the owner of the building beside them. There is one exception: owner-occupied one-, two- and three-family homes used exclusively as residences. For those the City remains responsible, and a claim against the City starts with a 90-day notice of claim rather than a three-year clock.

Jackson Heights contains both kinds of property within a block of each other. Fall outside a shop on 37th Avenue and the owner is answerable and you have the full three years. Fall outside a small house on one of the numbered streets and you may be facing the City on a 90-day clock instead.

Two questions decide it: whether an owner actually lives in the building, and whether any part of it is commercial. A two-family house with a shop on the ground floor is not exempt, because the law requires the property be used purely as a residence. Which is why a sidewalk fall is worth a phone call in the first week rather than the first year.

You do not need to be a citizen, and you do not need perfect English

More than 56,000 people living in Jackson Heights were born outside the United States. The largest communities come from Colombia, Ecuador, Mexico, China and Bangladesh.

Two things follow that are worth stating plainly, because many people here do not know them.

New York does not require you to be a citizen or a lawful permanent resident to bring a personal injury claim. Your immigration status is not the other side’s business and it does not decide whether you were owed a duty of care. That is as true on a construction site as it is on a crossing.

And you do not have to run your case in English. If you would rather speak Spanish, Bengali or Mandarin, say so on the first call and we will arrange it.

Where your Jackson Heights case will be heard

Most Queens personal injury cases are filed in the Supreme Court, Queens County, Civil Term, at 88-11 Sutphin Boulevard in Jamaica. Some civil matters are heard at the court’s Long Island City building at 25-10 Court Square.

Note that Sutphin Boulevard is the civil courthouse. The building on Queens Boulevard in Kew Gardens that people usually picture is the criminal court, and your injury case will not be there.

Depositions, motion appearances and conferences all happen locally, which is one practical argument for a Queens firm over one traveling in from Manhattan for every date on the calendar.

What to do after an accident in Jackson Heights

1. Get medical attention the same day, even if you feel fine. A gap between the accident and the first treatment is the first thing an insurer points to.
2. Call 911 and get a police report. Jackson Heights is covered by the 115th Precinct at 92-15 Northern Boulevard. If the police do not attend, file a report yourself.
3. Photograph everything before it is moved — the vehicles, the road, the hazard, your injuries, the light, the weather. Put something in the frame for scale.
4. Note the signal. If you were crossing with the walk, say so at the scene and get it into the police report. On these roads it is the single most valuable fact in the file.
5. Take names and numbers from witnesses. On Roosevelt Avenue there will be many and all of them will be gone in five minutes.
6. Ask about cameras. Shops, buses and the station carry them and the footage is routinely overwritten within weeks.
7. Do not give a recorded statement to the other side’s insurer. You are not obliged to, and it is rarely used to help you.
8. Watch the deadlines. Three years is the general rule. Ninety days is the rule where the City, the MTA or a public hospital is involved.

Jackson Heights injury claims — common questions

The driver says I stepped out. Does that stick?

Less often than insurers pretend, and on Northern Boulevard the city’s own study is the answer: 62 percent of the pedestrians hurt there were crossing with the signal, against a Queens average of 34 percent. Witnesses, camera footage and the damage pattern on the vehicle usually tell a different story from the one given at the roadside.

What does it cost to start?

Nothing. We work on contingency, so we take a percentage only if we recover money for you. If we recover nothing, you owe us nothing.

How long do I have to bring a claim?

Generally three years from the date of the accident, and two and a half years for medical malpractice. But if a city agency, the MTA or a public hospital is involved, a notice of claim has to be filed within 90 days. Since the nearest hospital here is a city hospital, that comes up more often in Jackson Heights than people expect.

I was taken to Elmhurst. Does that change anything?

For a claim against the driver, no. For any claim about the care you received there, yes — Elmhurst is a public hospital and that part carries the 90-day notice requirement. It is worth raising early even if you are not sure.

I was partly at fault. Is it worth calling?

Yes, and it is worth calling sooner rather than later, because the rule changed in 2026 and it now depends on what kind of accident it was.

In a car accident case, you can still recover if you were up to half at fault, and what you recover is reduced by your share. If you were more than half at fault, you recover nothing for pain and suffering.

In other injury cases — a fall, a construction accident, a dog bite — your share simply reduces what you recover and does not bar the claim.

Either way, the percentage is argued rather than obvious, and it is usually lower than the other side’s insurer first suggests.

The other driver had no insurance. Do I still have a case?

Often, yes. Your own policy may carry uninsured motorist coverage, and where the driver was never identified there is a state fund for exactly that situation. It has its own deadlines, so do not sit on it.

Do I have to come to the office?

No. We can take the details by phone or on WhatsApp, and if your injuries make travel difficult we will come to you.

Jackson Heights is one of many Queens neighborhoods we cover. See our injury work across Queens.