Using Embodied Videos of Walking Interviews in Walkability Assessment

Abstract

The relationship between the built environment and pedestrian travel behavior has inspired many geospatial-based and audit-based indexes for assessing the extent to which an environment is walkable. However, recent research suggests that their accuracy in predicting travel behavior varies depending on the characteristics of the populations being studied—a limitation especially pertinent for those who walk because they lack viable transportation alternatives. Examining the broader scope of walking determinants and mediators from the pedestrian perspective can take into account the mismatch between travel behavior and embodied experience. Social geography provides theoretical avenues for co-analyzing environmental and personal characteristics, while methodological and technological innovations provide ways of placing these theories into practice. A walking interview procedure supported by embodied video recording technology and sedentary interviews was designed to assess the walking environment according to residents’ unique perspectives of their neighborhoods. The walking interview allows for real-time engagement with pedestrians as they experience the environment, while video recording of these engagements offers sensory data that the researcher may use to interpret pedestrian statements and to draw retrospective conclusions. Aided by preceding sedentary interviews, the walking interview also illuminates how a pedestrian’s personal characteristics influence his or her perception of the built and social environment. It was concluded that, as designed, the procedure is well suited to support conventional walkability assessment tools by revealing how pedestrians’ characteristics and recollections shape their engagement with the built environment.