Crashed my car into a wall - advice needed

  • Thread starter Thread starter Deleted member 11679
  • Start date Start date

Deleted member 11679

Deleted member 11679

Hello,

This morning I was travelling to my girlfriends who lives on a reasonably steep hill in Nottingham (the road leads down onto a main road - Derby Road).

Anyway, coming round the top of the hill at roughly 10 - 15mph heading down I lost control of the car (skidded, went sideways etc) and mounted a kerb, hit a wall and came to a standstill at the bottom of the hill.

Now, this was a low speed accident but the wall I hit has been broken and requires some repair work (it's a private wall). My car has had its tracking knocked way out and requires a new bumper. The tacking is sorted but the bumper I am unsure about.

We know the neighbours and I am getting quotes sorted for repair to the wall.

The question I have is what might I expect to pay for a new bumper on Peurgeot 307 (57 plate)? I have been to the body shop but no-one was able to give me a price today.

Also, my girlfriends Mum contacted the Council/Highways-agency about the lack of gritting on this road late last week. It is relatively busy for a residential road and in the last week three cars have skidded onto my girlfriends lawn (one in fact broke the street sign). I don't suppose there is anyway of claiming from the Council/Highways-agency on this as it was reported days ago? Again, I would state I was driving extremely carefully at the top of the hill and it was purely because of the condition of the road the accident happened.

Any advice would be great.

Cheers,

Tom
 
I can't see the council paying a penny, with unprecedented levels of snow, ice, etc. They just can't grit everywhere. Looks like you'll have to take this one on the chin mate.
 
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I doubt you'll get anywhere with claiming from the council. It can be argues you weren't driving to the conditions of the road, which very well could be to not drive at all on there.
 
Doubt you'd get anywhere with the council, you're supposed to drive to the conditions, if the road wasn't passable, you shouldn't have tried. (yes i know you don't know you're going to slip until you actually slip, i'm just applying council logic)
 
No offence, but if you were in any doubt about the conditions of the roads then you shouldn't have driven. I can't see why you expect the council to foot the bill, the conditions are horrendous for everyone at the moment.
 
The council do have a statutory duty to keep the public highways in a reasonable condition. The only way that you will have even the slightest possibility of winning, however, is if they are not acting in accordance with their winter weather policy. Request a copy of this and then go from there.

The plan will no doubt split roads up in to A, B and C priority. Given the contents of your post this road would likely fit in their 'C' priority list meaning that it would only receive gritting once all the more major roads have been done, as such they're probably acting completely in line with their policy.
 
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Thank you for the advice so far, very much appreciated. It's as I suspected regards the Council, but I figured it was worth asking the question and also giving them a call on Monday.

With regards the road conditions, they were bad but I have driven down that hill 4 - 5 times in the last week in similar/worse scenarios. I was very much a passenger in this one!

RobRX-7 - I wouldn't know where to start with this, but obviously that kind of price would be much better for me than something running into 1000's!
 
TomWilko said:
it was purely because of the condition of the road the accident happened.
Click to expand...

No, it was because you were unable to control your car in the conditions that presented themselves. Unfortunately as you were the only person involved it is nobodies fault but yourself. I'll get flamed for this but the first thing to do in any accident is learn from it and you cant do that if you dont think it was entirely your fault, which it was.

Note to flamers: I'm not saying I or anyone else wouldnt have crashed. But if we had, it would have been our fault as well and not 'purely because of the condition of the road'.

I suspected you applied your brakes on the hill? I had a moment yesterday where I applied my brakes and it began to slide, it wasn't until I released the brake that I was able to regain control. I lost control momentarily because I failed to drive in the right way to suit the conditions, not 'purely because it was slipperly'.
 
Yup, got to agree with Fox. When you drive you take the risk and what ever the road conditions throws at you. If you feel it's too dangerous to drive, then quite simply you shouldn't. :)
 
Interesting way of looking at it Fox and I'll accept that. I've learnt not to go down that hill in poor weather that's for sure! I completely accept I was at fault. The five other people who have had incidents down this road (the ones we have seen anyway), clearly indicate to me that this road should be looked at by the council. Not 10 minutes after my incident someone else did the same thing but they bounced off the kerb (luckily for them).

I did apply my brakes briefly but the car rapidly picked up speed. I went into first gear but it didn't help. It was either a case of spin and try to hit the kerb/something on my way down, or end up in the middle of the main road at the bottom of the hill. It could have been worse, there was a couple on the other side of the road that could have been hit plus there is lamp posts dotted up and down the road.
 
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