Pedestrian Safety Issues Research Articles

Severity of road crashes involving pedestrians in Metro Manila, Philippines

Pedestrians are considered as one of the most vulnerable road users in less developed countries (LDCs). Yet, pedestrian safety remains poorly addressed in both urban and rural transportation plans in most LDCs. Since most pedestrian injury severity studies are conducted in developed countries, this study fills the gap with an inquiry focused on a highly urbanized region of an LDC that faces a rapid increase in car ownership and increasing pedestrian-related traffic injuries, documenting specific pedestrian safety issues and providing guidance for injury prevention measures in such places. Using the Metro Manila Accident Reporting and Analysis System (MMARAS) data from 2008 to 2011, this study combines binomial logistic regression and street level analysis that further explores the statistical results and examines other factors that contribute to collisions and increase the potential for serious injury or death in three cities in Metro Manila: Makati, Manila, and Quezon. The results of the binomial regression analysis show that traffic crashes that involve heavy and multiple vehicles, and an elderly pedestrian (60 years old and above), as well as those that occurred during the evening (7 pm to midnight) and late at night (1 am to 5 am) have significantly higher odds of resulting in a fatal outcome; when the crash involves a female pedestrian and when the road surface is wet the odds of a fatal outcome are lower. Moreover, by closely examining the environment of these roadways, the study finds that most pedestrian fatalities occur on high-speed, high-traffic-volume, multilane roadways, that are surrounded by land uses that generate a particularly problematic mix of heavy vehicular and pedestrian traffic. The street level analysis also finds that fatal pedestrian crashes occur close to different types of transit stations. The results of this study of three cities in Metro Manila, reflect the twofold challenge to pedestrian safety in rapidly urbanizing areas in countries such as the Philippines that are classified as lower-middle-income: they face some of the same pedestrian safety issues as more developed areas, but with a much larger number of pedestrians using the streets, and a built environment that was not planned for the high volume and speed of motor vehicle traffic on today’s roadways. Policies and planning that support increased pedestrian safety therefore need to address this dual challenge in the contexts where they are most needed.

Analysis of Road User Behavior and Safety During New York City’s Summer Streets Program

Automated computer vision video analysis techniques were used to analyze video data during the operation of New York City’s Summer Streets Program at a major signalized intersection. The main objectives of this study were to diagnose pedestrian and cyclist safety issues during the shared space operation and to demonstrate the feasibility of the automatic extraction of road user data (e.g., pedestrian, runner, rollerblader, or cyclist) required for microscopic behavior analysis. Road users’ speeds and pedestrian gait parameters (step frequency and step length) were automatically extracted and analyzed. Results show that pedestrian walking speed was highest during the Summer Streets operation (1.49 ± 0.54 m/s) because pedestrians had more street space to use and slowest during normal operations (1.30 ± 0.22 m/s). Bike speeds were low during the Summer Streets event (3.62 ± 0.97 m/s), likely because of interaction with pedestrians, but these speeds increased during normal traffic operations. Pedestrians and cyclists moving in groups tended to be slower and confirmed results found in previous studies. The safety analysis was conducted with traffic conflict techniques. It was observed that the lowest rate of conflicts between pedestrians and cyclists and between cyclists was found to be during Summer Streets operations. In addition, an analysis of spatial violations showed that some road users were not observing traffic rules in the transition period after Summer Streets ceased to operate.

Investigating macro-level hotzone identification and variable importance using big data: A random forest models approach

As Connected Vehicle technologies begin to be deployed along roadway networks, they will be providing massive amount of data. This big data can be useful in identifying safety hazardous zones, which can be complicated and unreliable today. Without sufficient data, past studies had to focus mostly on the micro-level networks. Research on macro-level hotzone identification is limited, and until this point, the contribution of various macroscopic features on the macro-level crash risks is still in dispute. This paper, with the help of massive amount of data, investigates the feasibility of using random forest for hotzone identification at macro-level – the Traffic Analysis Zone (TAZ) level. At the same time, the most influential macro-level crash risk determinants were identified by applying a series of random forest models in combination with the cross validation methods. The differences of all features between hotzones and normal TAZs were also recognized through Wilcoxon tests. Crash data of three counties in Florida during 2008 and 2009 were employed. Crash risks by different injury levels and collision types were investigated separately. Finally, the significance of various macroscopic variables was determined by different types of crash risks using variable importance analysis.The research results suggest that the distribution of road network and socio-economics are the two most important factors when proactively alleviating traffic safety issues. For developed urban areas, it is desirable to formulate specific traffic safety management strategies that accounts for zone-level socio-economics and development of road infrastructure. For zones with a higher percentage of school enrollment, pedestrian and bicycle friendly roadway system design are most beneficial. It is also desirable to take efficient countermeasures such as law enforcement and driving school training to regulate young drivers׳ behavior in school zones. For areas with high minority residence, there might be a need to use awareness campaigns in multiple languages to relieve pedestrian safety issues. Finally, additional attention should be paid to improve intersection design and management during the planning and operation processes.

Automated Pedestrian Safety Analysis at a Signalized Intersection in New York City: Automated Data Extraction for Safety Diagnosis and Behavioral Study

Automated computer vision techniques were used to analyze 2 h of video data collected at a major signalized intersection in New York City. The main objectives of this study were to diagnose pedestrian safety issues and identify contributing factors at the intersection and to demonstrate the feasibility of the automatic extraction of pedestrian data required for pedestrian behavior analysis—mainly pedestrian speed and gait parameters. The safety study was conducted with traffic conflict techniques. The main factor that contributed to the high number of pedestrian and vehicle conflicts was found to be pedestrian violations, mainly temporal violations in which pedestrians crossed the street during the “Don't Walk” or flashing “Don't Walk” phase. During the 2 h analyzed, about one-third of pedestrians were noncompliant with the signal timing or crosswalk boundary (17.9% spatial violations and 15.3% temporal violations). Pedestrian speed, step frequency, and step length were automatically extracted for 333 pedestrians and were found to follow the normal distribution with 95% confidence (mean and standard deviation of 1.47 ± 0.27 m/s, 1.96 ± 0.17 Hz, and 0.75 ± 0.14 m, respectively). Gait analysis showed that the walking speed for single pedestrians was 9% higher than for those who walked in groups. Males tended to be slightly faster than females, with higher step length but lower step frequency. Violators tended to have higher walking speeds compared with non-violators, and the difference in speed was dependent on step length but not on step frequency.

Survey About Pedestrian Safety and Attitudes Toward Automated Traffic Enforcement in Washington, D.C.

Objective: Pedestrians represent more than one third of all traffic deaths in Washington, D.C. The District plans to expand its long-standing automated traffic enforcement program in 2013 from speed and red light cameras to cameras to enforce pedestrian right-of-way laws at crosswalks and stop sign laws. This study collected information on the opinions, behaviors, and knowledge of D.C. residents related to camera enforcement and pedestrian safety issues. Methods: A telephone survey of 801 adult D.C. residents was conducted in November 2012 with approximately equal numbers of respondents in each of D.C.'s eight wards. Quotas were used to ensure that the sample was representative of the demographic characteristics of adults in each ward. For analyses combining responses across the wards, data were weighted to correspond with the demographic characteristics of adults in the city. Results: Most respondents believed that drivers speeding, running red lights, running stop signs, and not stopping for pedestrians are serious threats to their safety. Respondents strongly supported the speed and red light camera programs, with 76 percent of respondents favoring speed cameras and 87 percent favoring red light cameras. Support was more limited for the camera enforcement that was not yet in place at the time of the survey, with 50 percent of respondents favoring stop sign cameras and 47 percent of respondents favoring crosswalk cameras. Twenty-four percent of respondents had not driven a car in D.C. in the past month, and higher proportions of these nondrivers favored speed cameras (90%), stop sign cameras (67%), and crosswalk cameras (59%) than respondents who drove in D.C. in the past month. Respondents who supported camera enforcement cited safety as their main reason. More than 9 in 10 respondents knew that D.C. law requires drivers to stop for pedestrians crossing the street in marked crosswalks at intersections without traffic signals and midblock, but only 54 percent knew that drivers must stop for pedestrians crossing the street at intersections without marked crosswalks. Conclusions: Most residents supported speed cameras and red light cameras, but support was lower for stop sign and crosswalk cameras. Emphasizing the safety benefits of stop sign and crosswalk cameras and documenting the extent of safety problems at stop signs and crosswalks may increase support for these new forms of camera enforcement. Communities considering automated enforcement should take into account the opinions of pedestrians, even though they are not subject to camera citations.

Optimal Cycle Program of Traffic Lights With Particle Swarm Optimization

Optimal staging of traffic lights, and in particular optimal light cycle programs, is a crucial task in present day cities with potential benefits in terms of energy consumption, traffic flow management, pedestrian safety, and environmental issues. Nevertheless, very few publications in the current literature tackle this problem by means of automatic intelligent systems, and, when they do, they focus on limited areas with elementary traffic light schedules. In this paper, we propose an optimization approach in which a particle swarm optimizer (PSO) is able to find successful traffic light cycle programs. The solutions obtained are simulated with simulator of urban mobility, a well-known microscopic traffic simulator. For this study, we have tested two large and heterogeneous metropolitan areas with hundreds of traffic lights located in the cities of Bahía Blanca in Argentina (American style) and Málaga in Spain (European style). Our algorithm is shown to obtain efficient traffic light cycle programs for both kinds of cities. In comparison with expertly predefined cycle programs (close to real ones), our PSO achieved quantitative improvements for the two main objectives: 1) the number of vehicles that reach their destination and 2) the overall journey time.

Safety Effects On Pedestrians AtUrban Roundabouts: An Overview

Pedestrians are important users of the transportation system, but most guidelines have given them little importance in the geometric design of roads and intersections. Thus it can be difficult for vehicles and pedestrians to share the road, particularly at intersections where vehicle-pedestrian conflicts can be frequently recurring situations even with low pedestrian volume. In a sustainable safety vision, pedestrians and vehicles are required to safely share the road; thus the need that roads have a recognizable design and predictable traffic situations where users know what they should do and what they can expect from other users, should be even more deeply felt. It is well-known that modern roundabouts are safer than other intersection forms for effects on speeds and conflicts between users; several road authorities, indeed, have foreseen to convert specific types of intersections into roundabouts. To produce a better understanding of the potential impacts for the roundabout alternative, design considerations should be evaluated already at a planning level, emphasizing elements most favourable to the sharing and to use of road spaces equally distributed from a pedestrians safety perspective. Summarizing international experience with roundabouts and pedestrians, this paper provides a review of the existing literature dealing with pedestrian safety and accessibility issues at roundabouts. First, safety aspects at modern roundabouts are presented, followed by a brief explanation of the effects of roundabouts on pedestrian safety documented in the scientific literature. Finally, this research provides an overview of the current state of practice and implications in roundabout design to maximize potential with regard to safety for pedestrians.

Application of Computer Vision to Diagnosis of Pedestrian Safety Issues

The potential for using computer vision techniques to solve several shortcomings associated with traditional road safety and behavior analysis is demonstrated. Surrogate data such as traffic conflicts provide invaluable information that can be used to understand collision-contributing factors and the collision failure mechanism better. Recent advances in computer vision techniques have encouraged the use of proactive safety surrogate measures such as detection of conflicts and violations. The objective of this study is to demonstrate the automated safety diagnosis of pedestrian crossing safety issues by using computer vision techniques. The automated safety diagnosis is applied at a major signalized intersection in downtown Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, at which concerns had been raised regarding the high conflict rate between vehicles and pedestrians as well as the elevated number of traffic violations (i.e., jaywalking). This study is unique in its attempt to extract conflict indicators and detect violations from video sequences in a fully automated way. This line of research benefits safety experts because it provides a prompt and objective safety evaluation for intersections. The research also provides a permanent database for traffic information that can be beneficial for a sound safety diagnosis as well as for developing safety countermeasures.

Partnership Moves Community Toward Complete Streets

The Partnership for Active Communities brought together multidisciplinary organizations to create a 5-year project to support increased walking and bicycling in the Sacramento CA area. Using a community action model, the partnership focused on programs and promotions to expand walk- and bike-to-school programs. The partnership focused on policy and physical projects in conducting systematic reviews of development projects to influence land use. A comprehensive communications plan united diverse partnership interests to advocate for Complete Streets policy change and improve transportation infrastructure. Walk- and bike-to-school programs grew, and community-design workshops helped leverage more than $12 million in additional support, including Safe Routes to School grants. The partnership delivered more than 150 project reviews to city planners, architects, and developers with recommendations for improved pedestrian and bicycle infrastructure, and many positive changes resulted. Complete Streets is now included as a policy in the region's transportation plan, in the mobility element of the city's updated general plan and the county's draft circulation plan, and in the regional transit master plan. The partnership's communications plan linked partners with diverse interests to produce a powerful advocacy network to influence adoption of Complete Streets policies. Project development reviews were most successful in communities that allowed comments at a conceptual stage in the process. The Partnership for Active Communities produced increased public and agency awareness of pedestrian and bicycle safety issues and influenced considerable changes to policies and the physical environment in the Sacramento area.

The Path to Active Living: Physical Activity Through Community Design in Somerville, Massachusetts

Somerville, Massachusetts, an ethnically diverse, urban community northwest of Boston, presents opportunities and challenges for active living. With a dense street grid, well-maintained sidewalks, neighborhood parks, and existing Community Path, Somerville is very walkable. However, two major surface arteries traverse and bisect neighborhoods, creating pedestrian safety and environmental justice issues. Major goals included promoting increased collaboration and communication among existing active-living efforts; managing the Community Path extension project; encouraging Portuguese-speaking adults to incorporate daily physical activity; leveraging existing urban planning work to establish secure, attractive walking/biking corridors; and embedding active-living messages in everyday life. The Somerville Active Living by Design Partnership (ALbD) successfully created a robust task force that was integrated with citywide active-living efforts, secured resources to increase infrastructure and support for active living, including city-level coordinator positions, and changed decision-making practices that led to incorporation of pedestrian and bicycle transportation priorities into city planning and that influenced the extension of the Community Path. Partnerships must employ sustainability planning early on, utilize skilled facilitative leaders to manage leadership transitions, and engage new partners. Identifying, cultivating, and celebrating champions, especially those with political power, are critical. Working closely with research partners leads to rich data sources for planning and evaluation. Changing the built environment is difficult; working toward smaller wins is realistic and achievable. The synergy of ALbD and other community interventions created a foundation for short-term successes and accelerated political-cultural changes already underway with respect to active living.

From Pedestrian Safety to Environmental Justice: The Evolution of a Chinatown Community Campaign

Oakland Chinatown holds the record for the highest number of pedestrian and vehicle accidents in the City of Oakland. In response, Asian Health Services embarked on a local campaign focused on increasing awareness among community members about pedestrian safety issues. Recognizing the limits of addressing pedestrian injuries from an educational outreach approach focused on changing individual behavior, this campaign slowly evolved into an environmental justice campaign with a community capacity building perspective. Exemplifying the tenets of the Prevention Institute's California Campaign model to address health disparities, the current campaign, now entitled Revive Chinatown!, demonstrates how an ecological system approach can more effectively address a chronic public health problem, and how health centers can function as catalysts of community and economic development.

Improving nighttime mobility in persons with night blindness caused by retinitis pigmentosa: A comparison of two low-vision mobility devices

This study compared the effectiveness of the ITT Night Vision Viewer with the Wide Angle Mobility Lamp (WAML) as low-vision mobility devices for people experiencing night blindness due to retinitis pigmentosa (RP). Both engineering bench testing and functional evaluations were used in the assessments. Engineering evaluations were conducted for (1) consistency of the manufacturer's specifications, (2) ergonomic characteristics, (3) modifications of devices, and (4) pedestrian safety issues. Twenty-seven patients with RP conducted rehabilitation evaluations with each device that included both clinical and functional tests. Both devices improved nighttime travel for people with night blindness as compared with nighttime travel with no device. Overall, the WAML provided better travel efficiency-equivalent to that measured in daytime. Recommendations have been developed on ergonomic factors for both devices. Although some participants preferred the ITT Night Vision Viewer, overall most participants performed better with the WAML.

From Pedestrian Safety to Environmental Justice: The Evolution of a Chinatown Community Campaign

Oakland Chinatown holds the record for the highest number of pedestrian and vehicle accidents in the City of Oakland. In response, Asian Health Services embarked on a local campaign focused on increasing awareness among community members about pedestrian safety issues. Recognizing the limits of addressing pedestrian injuries from an educational outreach approach focused on changing individual behavior, this campaign with a community capacity building perspective. Exemplifying the tenets of the Prevention Institute’s California Campaign model to address health disparities, the current campaign now entitled Revive Chinatown!demonstrates how an ecological system approach can more effectively address a chronic public health problem, and how health centers can function as catalysts of community and economic development.

Drivers' Perception of Pedestrians' Rights and Walking Environments

A pedestrian and traffic safety study was conducted in San Diego County, California, with 1,587 adult and teenage traffic violators who were attending traffic school. The surveys were disaggregated on the basis of respondents' demographic characteristics. There were 589 Spanish speakers and 998 English speakers. The surveys measured respondents' safe driving score and correlated the score with their assessment of safety and the level of aggression shown toward pedestrians in six photographs. Photographs were selected to depict certain pedestrian and driving environments and pedestrian-vehicle interactions. The photographs were used as a means of assessing the drivers' level of sensitivity to pedestrian environments. Respondents were asked to assess drivers' behaviors on certain roads, their levels of aggression toward pedestrians, and the quality of sidewalks. Responses to the photographs were analyzed with demographic differences (adults and teen, Spanish and English) and the safe driving measure scores. Significant differences were found in the responses on the basis of driving measure and demographic differences. Many respondents were unaware of California laws related to pedestrian's rights and duties when sidewalks are missing. They were also insensitive to pedestrian-driver conflict situations. Some of the lack in understanding or empathy toward pedestrians is due to inadequate treatment of pedestrian safety issues in the literature on aggressive driving. On the basis of this research, it is felt that aggressive acts toward pedestrians need to be included in the definition of aggressive driving so that drivers are made aware of the rights of pedestrians.

Evaluation of Pedestrian Data Needs and Collection Efforts

Research was done to evaluate the extent to which the pedestrian data collection efforts of transportation agencies in the United States are addressing pedestrian safety factors. There was also consideration of how pedestrian data collection can be improved to facilitate the monitoring of these factors. Fifteen pedestrian safety issues are identified based on a literature review and examination of pedestrian–vehicle crashes in Utah. A 2001 survey of U.S. transportation agencies indicated that 45 (75%) of the 60 respondents were counting pedestrians at various locations. Hand counting, the recording of push-button use, and video cameras were methods used to collect data. Automated systems, such as position sensors and image processing, were not used to count pedestrians. The use of advanced data collection technologies is not critical to the resolution of pedestrian safety concerns, although permanent counting installations might increase data collection efficiency. Only 4 of the 15 pedestrian safety issues were specifically being addressed by the agencies’ data collection efforts. Their existing methods could, however, be used to target seven additional safety factors. The development of a pedestrian data monitoring guide is recommended; an outline is proposed. Several agencies admitted that pedestrian volumes did not affect their pedestrian treatments. Evidently, some transportation agencies could benefit from direction on how to relate pedestrian demand and behavior data to safety improvements.