Evaluation of the influence of roadside non-walking spaces on the pedestrian environment of a Japanese urban street

Abstract

To implement the idea of constructing cities from the perspective of pedestrians, it is essential to create not only glamorous landscapes along streets that can promote walking habits but also street spaces that allow pedestrians to perform various actions. Since walking can induce several actions such as taking a break, it is very important to provide suitable spaces for such actions. In this study, we propose evaluation methods to determine whether the distribution of intermediate spaces situated between public and private spaces has any effect on traveling legibility and amusement. Specifically, 12 street layouts, composed by permuting three types of routes and four types of spaces, are proposed. To test these, a pedestrian experiment was conducted, in which the 12 propositions were compared and analyzed based on their attractiveness and legibility for pedestrians. Multivariate analysis of variance showed that roadside non-walking spaces have a direct influence on pedestrians’ imaginary behavior and legibility of the streets. In addition, we found that concentrating publicly accessible private spaces at crossroads increases traveling legibility and pedestrians’ imaginary behavior.