Determining the sidewalk pavement width by using pedestrian discomfort levels and movement characteristics

Abstract

This paper presents a sidewalk pavement width design method for making more pedestrian friendly and walk-inspiring sidewalk pavements in the urban area. Instead of using the current sidewalk pavement width design standard that usually leads to having minimum values, this research investigated pedestrians’ preferences on the levels of service, surveyed actual foot path trajectories in the sidewalk pavements, and observed pedestrian movement characteristics in the streets. Further, these investigation results were summarized to propose a new urban sidewalk pavement width determination procedure. The proposed procedure was applied in a case study site in Seoul, and its application resulted in a much higher pedestrian level of service. It is anticipated that the proposed method should be of service in both planning and retrofitting urban streets to make more pedestrian sensitive street designs.