Creating pedestrian crash scenarios in a driving simulator environment.

PubMed

Chrysler, Susan T; Ahmad, Omar; Schwarz, Chris W

2015-01-01

In 2012 in the United States, pedestrian injuries accounted for 3.3% of all traffic injuries but, disproportionately, pedestrian fatalities accounted for roughly 14% of traffic-related deaths (NHTSA 2014 ). In many other countries, pedestrians make up more than 50% of those injured and killed in crashes. This research project examined driver response to crash-imminent situations involving pedestrians in a high-fidelity, full-motion driving simulator. This article presents a scenario development method and discusses experimental design and control issues in conducting pedestrian crash research in a simulation environment. Driving simulators offer a safe environment in which to test driver response and offer the advantage of having virtual pedestrian models that move realistically, unlike test track studies, which by nature must use pedestrian dummies on some moving track. An analysis of pedestrian crash trajectories, speeds, roadside features, and pedestrian behavior was used to create 18 unique crash scenarios representative of the most frequent and most costly crash types. For the study reported here, we only considered scenarios where the car is traveling straight because these represent the majority of fatalities. We manipulated driver expectation of a pedestrian both by presenting intersection and mid-block crossing as well as by using features in the scene to direct the driver's visual attention toward or away from the crossing pedestrian. Three visual environments for the scenarios were used to provide a variety of roadside environments and speed: a 20-30 mph residential area, a 55 mph rural undivided highway, and a 40 mph urban area. Many variables of crash situations were considered in selecting and developing the scenarios, including vehicle and pedestrian movements; roadway and roadside features; environmental conditions; and characteristics of the pedestrian, driver, and vehicle. The driving simulator scenarios were subjected to iterative testing to

Influence of children pedestrian behaviour on pedestrian space usage

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Makalew, F. P.; Adisasmita, S. A.; Wunas, S.; Hamid, S.

2017-11-01

School children pedestrian behaviour can be seen along their journey to and from school. Pedestrian spaces used by children are places available in urban and rural areas including streets with and without pedestrian pathways. Samples data are collected from 23 elementary schools in urban and rural areas in North Sulawesi, Indonesia in the form of video records and photos taken. The aim of this research is to analyse children pedestrian behaviour and its influence on the space usage on pedestrian areas. Method of analysis is a comparative study on urban and rural areas. Results of this research are types of behaviour, factors that influence the behaviour, physical condition of pedestrian areas and space usage by children. The behaviours are duck-line walking, running, playing, walking backward and walking with bare foot in which running is the main behaviour. These behaviours are influenced by factors including following friends and responding to acts. There are similarities and differences between pedestrian space usage in urban and rural areas. Space use by children pedestrian demonstrates the way pedestrian areas should be planned. Space usage by children pedestrian indicates that there is a need of evaluation of the space available considering pedestrian children behaviour.

Vehicle-pedestrian collisions - Aspects regarding pedestrian kinematics, dynamics and biomechanics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Petrescu, L.; Petrescu, Al

2017-10-01

Vehicle-pedestrian collisions result in a substantial number of pedestrian fatalities and injuries worldwide. Concern continues to limit and reduce the tragic consequences suffered by pedestrians involved in road accidents, caused the vehicle-pedestrian accident reconstruction become an important area and distinctly outlined in the reconstruction of road incidents involving vehicle. This paper analyzes the dynamics of vehicle-pedestrian impact influence over pedestrian biomechanics, which is directly connected with the severity of injury after contact with the vehicle profile and with the place where the pedestrian is projected. The main goal of this paper is to highlight some features of reconstruction of road accidents involving pedestrian, looking at the kinematics and dynamics of pedestrian impact for a better understanding of the phenomena that occur. The study on the dynamics and biomechanics of the pedestrian hit by the vehicle is useful in order to understand how the injuries, including the lethal ones, are generated in the collision, what is essential in road accidents reconstruction.

Kinematic responses and injuries of pedestrian in car-pedestrian collisions

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Teng, T. L.; Liang, C. C.; Hsu, C. Y.; Tai, S. F.

2017-10-01

How to protect pedestrians and reduce the collision injury has gradually become the new field of automotive safety research and focus in the world. Many engineering studies have appeared and their purpose is trying to reduce the pedestrian injuries caused by traffic accident. The physical model involving impactor model and full scale pedestrian model are costly when taking the impact test. This study constructs a vehicle-pedestrian collision model by using the MADYMO. To verify the accuracy of the proposed vehicle-pedestrian collision model, the experimental data are used in the pedestrian model test. The proposed model also will be applied to analyze the kinematic responses and injuries of pedestrian in collisions in this study. The modeled results can help assess the pedestrian friendliness of vehicles and assist in the future development of pedestrian friendliness vehicle technologies.

Preventing child pedestrian injury: pedestrian education or traffic calming?

PubMed

Roberts, I; Ashton, T; Dunn, R; Lee-Joe, T

1994-06-01

The traditional approach to the prevention of child pedestrian injuries in New Zealand is pedestrian education. However, none of the programs currently being implemented in New Zealand have ever been shown to reduce injury rates. The allocation of scarce resources to pedestrian education must therefore be questioned. In this paper we estimate the number of serious child pedestrian injuries which might be prevented if the resources allocated to pedestrian education were allocated instead to environmental approaches, in particular, to traffic calming. It is estimated that approximately 18 hospitalisations of child pedestrians could be prevented each year under this alternative resource allocation, disregarding any other benefits of traffic calming. These results emphasise the need to consider the potential sacrifices involved in the allocation of scarce resources to child pedestrian education.

Pedestrian signalization and the risk of pedestrian-motor vehicle collisions in Lima, Peru

PubMed Central

Quistberg, D. Alex; Koepsell, Thomas D.; Boyle, Linda Ng; Miranda, J. Jaime; Johnston, Brian D.; Ebel, Beth E.

2014-01-01

Safe walking environments are essential for protecting pedestrians and promoting physical activity. In Peru, pedestrians comprise of over three-quarters of road fatality victims. Pedestrian signalization plays an important role managing pedestrian and vehicle traffic and may help improve pedestrian safety. We examined the relationship between pedestrian-motor vehicle collisions and the presence of visible traffic signals, pedestrian signals, and signal timing to determine whether these countermeasures improved pedestrian safety. A matched case-control design was used where the units of study were crossing locations. We randomly sampled 97 control-matched collisions (weighted N=1134) at intersections occurring from October, 2010 to January, 2011 in Lima. Each case-control pair was matched on proximity, street classification, and number of lanes. Sites were visited between February, 2011 and September, 2011. Each analysis accounted for sampling weight and matching and was adjusted for vehicle and pedestrian traffic flow, crossing width, and mean vehicle speed. Collisions were more common where a phased pedestrian signal (green or red-lit signal) was present compared to no signalization (odds ratio [OR] 8.88, 95% Confidence Interval [CI] 1.32–59.6). A longer pedestrian-specific signal duration was associated with collision risk (OR 5.31, 95% CI 1.02–9.60 per 15-second interval). Collisions occurred more commonly in the presence of any signalization visible to pedestrians or pedestrian-specific signalization, though these associations were not statistically significant. Signalization efforts were not associated with lower risk for pedestrians; rather, they were associated with an increased risk of pedestrian-vehicle collisions. PMID:24821630

Pedestrian signalization and the risk of pedestrian-motor vehicle collisions in Lima, Peru.

PubMed

Quistberg, D Alex; Koepsell, Thomas D; Boyle, Linda Ng; Miranda, J Jaime; Johnston, Brian D; Ebel, Beth E

2014-09-01

Safe walking environments are essential for protecting pedestrians and promoting physical activity. In Peru, pedestrians comprise over three-quarters of road fatality victims. Pedestrian signalization plays an important role managing pedestrian and vehicle traffic and may help improve pedestrian safety. We examined the relationship between pedestrian-motor vehicle collisions and the presence of visible traffic signals, pedestrian signals, and signal timing to determine whether these countermeasures improved pedestrian safety. A matched case-control design was used where the units of study were crossing locations. We randomly sampled 97 control-matched collisions (weighted N=1134) at intersections occurring from October, 2010 to January, 2011 in Lima. Each case-control pair was matched on proximity, street classification, and number of lanes. Sites were visited between February, 2011 and September, 2011. Each analysis accounted for sampling weight and matching and was adjusted for vehicle and pedestrian traffic flow, crossing width, and mean vehicle speed. Collisions were more common where a phased pedestrian signal (green or red-light signal) was present compared to no signalization (odds ratio [OR] 8.88, 95% Confidence Interval [CI] 1.32-59.6). A longer pedestrian-specific signal duration was associated with collision risk (OR 5.31, 95% CI 1.02-9.60 per 15-s interval). Collisions occurred more commonly in the presence of any signalization visible to pedestrians or pedestrian-specific signalization, though these associations were not statistically significant. Signalization efforts were not associated with lower risk for pedestrians; rather, they were associated with an increased risk of pedestrian-vehicle collisions. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Pedestrian injury causation study (pedestrian accident typing)

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1982-08-01

A new computerized pedestrian accident typing procedure was tested on 1,997 cases from the Pedestrian Injury Causation Study (PICS). Two coding procedures were used to determine the effects of quantity and quality of information on accident typing ac...

Pedestrian and motorists' actions at pedestrian hybrid beacon sites: findings from a pilot study.

PubMed

Pulugurtha, Srinivas S; Self, Debbie R

2015-01-01

This paper focuses on an analysis of pedestrian and motorists' actions at sites with pedestrian hybrid beacons and assesses their effectiveness in improving the safety of pedestrians. Descriptive and statistical analyses (one-tail two-sample T-test and two-proportion Z-test) were conducted using field data collected during morning and evening peak hours at three study sites in the city of Charlotte, NC, before and after the installation of pedestrian hybrid beacons. Further, an analysis was conducted to assess the change in pedestrian and motorists' actions over time (before the installation; 1 month, 3 months, 6 months, and 12 months after the installation). Results showed an increase in average traffic speed at one of the pedestrian hybrid beacon sites while no specific trends were observed at the other two pedestrian hybrid beacon sites. A decrease in the number of motorists not yielding to pedestrians, pedestrians trapped in the middle of the street, and pedestrian-vehicle conflicts were observed at all the three pedestrian hybrid beacon sites. The installation of pedestrian hybrid beacons did not have a negative effect on pedestrian actions at two out of the three sites. Improvements seem to be relatively more consistent 3 months after the installation of the pedestrian hybrid beacon.

Prediction of trauma-specific death rates of pedestrians of Fars Province, Iran.

PubMed

Akbari, Maryam; Tabrizi, Reza; Heydari, Seyed Taghi; Sekhavati, Eghbal; Moosazadeh, Mahmood; Lankarani, Kamran Bagheri

2015-09-01

Pedestrians are the most vulnerable group to accidents among road users. Due to the well-known concerns and complications of accidents involving pedestrians, the aim of this study was to identify the rate of such accidents for five-year period. We analyzed all fatalities among pedestrians caused by traffic accidents during years of 2009-2013 in Fars Province in Iran. The study was a cross-sectional study in which logistic regression analysis was used to predict the death rate among pedestrians. Sensitivity analysis using the Monte Carlo method was used to increase the accuracy of the results. Then, we predicted the death rates for the years 2014-2018 predicted and compared the results with the actual data from the previous five-year period (2009-2013). During 2009-2013, 1723 out of 8689 (20.3%) of the people killed in traffic accidents were pedestrians. The death rate for male pedestrians in 2011 was estimated to be 10.86 per 100,000 (with an uncertainty interval of 95% giving a range of 9.85-12.05 per 100,000). Compared to the data for 2006, this represented a decrease of 20% (with a mean decrease of 4% per year). Based on these data, the death date in 2018n was projected to be 8.08 per 100,000 (with an uncertainty interval of 95% giving a range of 7.26-8.87). Similar data and analysis for women indicated that the reduction in the rate of fatalities has been smaller than that for men in recent years, i.e., 2.2% versus 4%. Although great progress has been made in reducing traffic accidents, to date, the death rate is still high among pedestrians. It is essential to continue to find ways to reduce traffic accidents and the pedestrians' deaths associated with them, especially among the elderly, who make up a disproportionate fraction of the deaths.

An on-board pedestrian detection and warning system with features of side pedestrian

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Cheng, Ruzhong; Zhao, Yong; Wong, ChupChung; Chan, KwokPo; Xu, Jiayao; Wang, Xin'an

2012-01-01

Automotive Active Safety(AAS) is the main branch of intelligence automobile study and pedestrian detection is the key problem of AAS, because it is related with the casualties of most vehicle accidents. For on-board pedestrian detection algorithms, the main problem is to balance efficiency and accuracy to make the on-board system available in real scenes, so an on-board pedestrian detection and warning system with the algorithm considered the features of side pedestrian is proposed. The system includes two modules, pedestrian detecting and warning module. Haar feature and a cascade of stage classifiers trained by Adaboost are first applied, and then HOG feature and SVM classifier are used to refine false positives. To make these time-consuming algorithms available in real-time use, a divide-window method together with operator context scanning(OCS) method are applied to increase efficiency. To merge the velocity information of the automotive, the distance of the detected pedestrian is also obtained, so the system could judge if there is a potential danger for the pedestrian in the front. With a new dataset captured in urban environment with side pedestrians on zebra, the embedded system and its algorithm perform an on-board available result on side pedestrian detection.

Prediction of trauma-specific death rates of pedestrians of Fars Province, Iran

PubMed Central

Akbari, Maryam; Tabrizi, Reza; Heydari, Seyed Taghi; Sekhavati, Eghbal; Moosazadeh, Mahmood; Lankarani, Kamran Bagheri

2015-01-01

Introduction: Pedestrians are the most vulnerable group to accidents among road users. Due to the well-known concerns and complications of accidents involving pedestrians, the aim of this study was to identify the rate of such accidents for five-year period. Methods: We analyzed all fatalities among pedestrians caused by traffic accidents during years of 2009–2013 in Fars Province in Iran. The study was a cross-sectional study in which logistic regression analysis was used to predict the death rate among pedestrians. Sensitivity analysis using the Monte Carlo method was used to increase the accuracy of the results. Then, we predicted the death rates for the years 2014–2018 predicted and compared the results with the actual data from the previous five-year period (2009–2013). Results: During 2009–2013, 1723 out of 8689 (20.3%) of the people killed in traffic accidents were pedestrians. The death rate for male pedestrians in 2011 was estimated to be 10.86 per 100,000 (with an uncertainty interval of 95% giving a range of 9.85–12.05 per 100,000). Compared to the data for 2006, this represented a decrease of 20% (with a mean decrease of 4% per year). Based on these data, the death date in 2018n was projected to be 8.08 per 100,000 (with an uncertainty interval of 95% giving a range of 7.26–8.87). Similar data and analysis for women indicated that the reduction in the rate of fatalities has been smaller than that for men in recent years, i.e., 2.2% versus 4%. Conclusion: Although great progress has been made in reducing traffic accidents, to date, the death rate is still high among pedestrians. It is essential to continue to find ways to reduce traffic accidents and the pedestrians’ deaths associated with them, especially among the elderly, who make up a disproportionate fraction of the deaths. PMID:26435824

Features of pedestrian behavior in car-to-pedestrian contact situations in near-miss incidents in Japan.

PubMed

Matsui, Yasuhiro; Hitosugi, Masahito; Doi, Tsutomu; Oikawa, Shoko; Takahashi, Kunio; Ando, Kenichi

2013-01-01

The objective of this study is to evaluate the severe conditions between car-to-pedestrian near-miss situations using pedestrian time-to-vehicle (pedestrian TTV) which is the time when the pedestrian would reach the forward moving car line. Since the information available from the real-world accidents was limited, the authors focused on the near-miss situations captured by driving recorders installed in passenger cars. In their previous study, the authors found there were some similarities between accidents and near-miss incidents. It was made clear that the situations in pedestrians' accidents could be estimated from the near-miss incident data which included motion pictures capturing pedestrian behaviors. In their previous study, the vehicle time-to-collision (vehicle TTC) was investigated from the near-miss incident data. The authors analyzed data for 101 near-miss car-to-pedestrian incident events in which pedestrians were crossing the roads in front of a forward-moving car at an intersection or on a straight road. Using a video of near-miss car-to-pedestrian incidents captured by drive recorders and collected by the Society of Automotive Engineers of Japan (J-SAE) from 2005 to 2009, the pedestrian TTV was calculated. Based on the calculated pedestrian TTV, one of the severe conditions between car-to-pedestrian near-miss situations was evaluated for pedestrians who emerged from behind an obstruction such as a building, a parked vehicle and a moving vehicle. Focusing on the cases of the pedestrians who emerged from behind an obstruction, the averages of the vehicle TTC and pedestrian TTV were 1.31 and 1.05 seconds, respectively, and did not demonstrate a significant difference. Since the averages of the vehicle TTC and pedestrian TTV were similar, there would be a higher possibility of the contact between a car and pedestrian if the driver and pedestrian were not paying any attention. The authors propose that a moving speed of a pedestrian surrogate "dummy

Situations of car-to-pedestrian contact.

PubMed

Matsui, Yasuhiro; Hitosugi, Masahito; Takahashi, Kunio; Doi, Tsutomu

2013-01-01

To reduce the severity of injuries and the number of pedestrian deaths in traffic accidents, active safety devices providing pedestrian detection are considered effective countermeasures. The features of car-to-pedestrian collisions need to be known in detail to develop such safety devices. Because information on real-world accidents is limited, this study investigated near-miss situations captured by drive recorders installed in passenger cars. We showed similarities of the contact situation between near-miss incidents and real-world fatal pedestrian accidents in Japan. We analyzed the near-miss incident data via video capturing pedestrians crossing the road in front of forward-moving cars. Using a video frame captured by a drive recorder, the time to collision (TTC) was calculated from the car velocity and the distance between the car and pedestrian at the moment that the pedestrian initially appeared. The average TTC in the cases where pedestrians were not using a pedestrian crossing was shorter than that in the cases where pedestrians were using a pedestrian crossing. The average TTC in the cases where pedestrians emerged from behind obstructions was shorter than that in the cases where drivers had unobstructed views of the pedestrians. We propose that the specifications of the safety device for pedestrian detection and automatic braking should reflect the severe approach situation for a pedestrian and car including the TTC observed for near-miss incidents.

Pedestrian safety action plan.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2009-06-01

In 2005, Arizona ranked 5th among states in pedestrian fatalities per 100,000 residents, with 164 : pedestrian fatalities on Arizonas roadwaysa nearly 30 percent increase from 2003 levels. To reduce : the number of pedestrian crashes in Arizona...

[Pedestrian head injury biomechanics and damage mechanism. Pedestrian protection automotive regulation assessment].

PubMed

Arregui-Dalmases, Carlos; Rebollo-Soria, M Carmen; Sanchez-Molina, David; Velazquez-Ameijide, Juan; Teijeira Alvarez

Pedestrian-vehicle collisions are a leading cause of death among motor vehicle accidents. Recently, pedestrian injury research has been increased, mostly due to the implementation of European and Japanese regulations. This research presents an analysis of the main head injury vehicle sources and injury mechanisms observed in the field, posteriorly the data are compared with the current pedestrian regulations. The analysis has been performed through an epidemiologic transversal and descriptive study, using the Pedestrian Crash Data Study (PCDS) involving 552 pedestrians, sustaining a total of 4.500 documented injuries. According to this research, the hood surface is responsible for only 15,1% of all the head injuries. On the other hand, the windshield glazing is responsible for 41,8%. In case of sedan vehicles the head impact location exceeds what is expected in the current regulation, and therefore no countermeasures are applied. From all the head injuries sustained by the pedestrians just 20% have the linear acceleration as isolated injury mechanism, 40% of the injuries are due to rotational acceleration. In this research, the importance of the rotational acceleration as injury mechanism, in case of pedestrian-vehicle collision is highlighted. In the current pedestrian regulation just the linear acceleration is addressed in the main injury criteria used for head injury prediction. Copyright © 2016 Sociedad Española de Neurocirugía. Publicado por Elsevier España, S.L.U. All rights reserved.

Measuring pedestrian volumes and conflicts. Volume 1, Pedestrian volume sampling

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1987-12-01

This final report presents the findings, conclusions, and recommendations of the study conducted to develop a model to predict pedestrian volumes using small sampling schemes. This research produced four pedestrian volume prediction models (i.e., 1-,...

Harnessing Vehicle-to-Pedestrian (V2P) Communication Technology: Sending Traffic Warnings to Texting Pedestrians.

PubMed

Rahimian, Pooya; O'Neal, Elizabeth E; Zhou, Shiwen; Plumert, Jodie M; Kearney, Joseph K

2018-06-01

We examined how sending mobile-device warnings to texting pedestrians when they initiate an unsafe road crossing influences their decisions and actions. Pedestrian texting has been identified as a key risk factor in pedestrian-vehicle collisions. Advances in sensing and communications technology offer the possibility of providing pedestrians with information about traffic conditions to assist them in safely crossing traffic-filled roadways. However, it is unclear how this information can be most effectively communicated to pedestrians. We examined how texting and nontexting pedestrians crossed roads with continuous traffic in a large-screen, immersive pedestrian simulator using a between-subjects design with three conditions: texting, warning, and control. Texting participants in the warning condition received an alarm on their cell phone when they began to cross a dangerously small gap. The results demonstrate the detrimental influence of texting on pedestrians' gap selection, movement timing, and gaze behavior, and show the potential of warnings to improve decision making and safety. However, the results also reveal the limits of warning texting participants once they initiate a crossing and possible overreliance on technology that may lead to reduced situation awareness. Mobile devices and short-range communication technologies offer enormous potential to assist pedestrians, but further study is needed to better understand how to provide useful information in a timely manner. The technology for communicating traffic information to pedestrians via mobile devices is on the horizon. Research on how such information influences all aspects of pedestrian behavior is critical to developing effective solutions.

Dutch pedestrian safety research review

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1999-12-01

This report is one in a series of pedestrian safety synthesis reports prepared for the Federal Highway Administration to document pedestrian safety in other countries. This report reviews recent pedestrian safety research in the Netherlands. It addre...

Pedestrian Safety in Road Traffic in Poland

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Budzynski, Marcin; Jamroz, Kazimierz; Mackun, Tomasz

2017-10-01

Every third road accident in Poland involves a pedestrian as a participant or, most of the time, a casualty. Pedestrian accidents are usually the result of complex situations and the outcome of a number of factors related to driver and pedestrian behaviour and road infrastructure. Safety depends largely on how well the traffic condition is perceived and on visibility in traffic. The paper presents the results of analyses of methodologies for systematic studies of pedestrian behaviour and pedestrian-driver relations. The effects of the location of the site, type of cross-section and other selected parameters on pedestrian and driver behaviour are demonstrated. The analyses showed that pedestrians are most often put at risk by too long pedestrian crossings, vehicles going too fast around pedestrian crossings, lack of proper sight distance and poorly lit or unlit pedestrian crossings. The reason for such defective infrastructure is that planners, designers, contractors and maintenance services are not receiving any support from design, marking and maintenance regulations for pedestrian traffic. In addition, the Road Traffic Law is not restrictive enough when it comes to drivers’ obligations towards pedestrian safety. Polish design regulations allow long pedestrian crossings up to four lanes in one direction or three lanes in two directions irrespective of traffic control and speed limits. Pedestrian crossings should be kept at a maximum of three lanes. There is nothing in the design regulations about the required driver-pedestrian sight distance. Neither does the Road Traffic Law help engineers with that. It is legal to park vehicles within 10 m of a pedestrian crossing which does not guarantee the necessary sight distance. Drivers must be able to see a pedestrian waiting or stepping onto the crossing from a distance that will help them come to a stop safely. It is safer to follow the principle of providing adequate pedestrian sight distance. Recommendations for

Canadian research on pedestrian safety

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1999-12-01

This report is one in a series of pedestrian safety synthesis reports prepared for the Federal Highway Administration to document pedestrian safety in other countries. This report reviews Canadian research in six areas of pedestrian safety: (1) Inter...

[Use and non-use of pedestrian bridges in Mexico City. The pedestrian perspective].

PubMed

Hidalgo-Solórzano, Elisa; Campuzano-Rincón, Julio; Rodríguez-Hernández, Jorge M; Chias-Becerril, Luis; Reséndiz-López, Héctor; Sánchez-Restrepo, Harvey; Baranda-Sepúlveda, Bernardo; Franco-Arias, Claudia; Híjar, Martha

2010-01-01

To analyze the motives for using and not using pedestrian bridges (PB). A cross-sectional survey was conducted of a sample of pedestrian users and non-users of PB; a logistic regression model was used to analyze the motives for use and non-use. The prevalence of non-use was 50.5 % of 813 surveyed pedestrians; the principal reason to use a PB was safety, and not to use it was "laziness". There were significant differences when analyzing the reason of non-use in the age groups 19 to 36 years, adjusted for education and physical characteristics of the PB ([aOR=1.7; 95 % CI=1.06-2.86] and [ORa.1.9; 95 % CI=1.14-3.33], respectively). The results of this study allow us to identify important aspects to consider--from the perspective of the pedestrians--when constructing new PB and improving existing PB to increase use in areas with a high risk of pedestrian injuries.

On-Board Detection of Pedestrian Intentions

PubMed Central

Fang, Zhijie; Vázquez, David

2017-01-01

Avoiding vehicle-to-pedestrian crashes is a critical requirement for nowadays advanced driver assistant systems (ADAS) and future self-driving vehicles. Accordingly, detecting pedestrians from raw sensor data has a history of more than 15 years of research, with vision playing a central role. During the last years, deep learning has boosted the accuracy of image-based pedestrian detectors. However, detection is just the first step towards answering the core question, namely is the vehicle going to crash with a pedestrian provided preventive actions are not taken? Therefore, knowing as soon as possible if a detected pedestrian has the intention of crossing the road ahead of the vehicle is essential for performing safe and comfortable maneuvers that prevent a crash. However, compared to pedestrian detection, there is relatively little literature on detecting pedestrian intentions. This paper aims to contribute along this line by presenting a new vision-based approach which analyzes the pose of a pedestrian along several frames to determine if he or she is going to enter the road or not. We present experiments showing 750 ms of anticipation for pedestrians crossing the road, which at a typical urban driving speed of 50 km/h can provide 15 additional meters (compared to a pure pedestrian detector) for vehicle automatic reactions or to warn the driver. Moreover, in contrast with state-of-the-art methods, our approach is monocular, neither requiring stereo nor optical flow information. PMID:28946632

Improving Pedestrian Safety at Signalized Intersections

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2012-06-01

Our research investigated methods and technologies to make signalized intersections safer for pedestrians using the capabilities : of accessible pedestrian systems. Our research focused on three technologies: acoustic beaconing, passive pedestrian de...

Coroners' records of accidental deaths.

PubMed Central

Levene, S

1991-01-01

This study set out to provide a description of the children involved in fatal accidents and to ascertain which deaths might have been prevented and by what means. The records from a convenience sample of four coroners (jurisdictions of Inner North London, Birmingham, Bedfordshire, and Ipswich) of inquests opened in 1984-8 on children aged under 15 killed in accidents were reviewed for information on the deceased, the accident, and the injuries sustained. Altogether 225 records (150 boys, 75 girls) were examined. Accidents to pedestrians were the commonest cause of death (81 cases), and road safety engineering measures were the most likely means by which most fatalities might have been prevented. The records frequently omitted information on social circumstances, family structure, ethnic group, or the use of safety equipment. Cooperative coroners can contribute to child safety as their records are rich in information about accidents. This could be made available to parties interested in accident prevention, including community paediatricians. PMID:1953011

Correlation Between Euro NCAP Pedestrian Test Results and Injury Severity in Injury Crashes with Pedestrians and Bicyclists in Sweden.

PubMed

Strandroth, Johan; Sternlund, Simon; Lie, Anders; Tingvall, Claes; Rizzi, Matteo; Kullgren, Anders; Ohlin, Maria; Fredriksson, Rikard

2014-11-01

Pedestrians and bicyclists account for a significant share of deaths and serious injuries in the road transport system. The protection of pedestrians in car-to-pedestrian crashes has therefore been addressed by friendlier car fronts and since 1997, the European New Car Assessment Program (Euro NCAP) has assessed the level of protection for most car models available in Europe. In the current study, Euro NCAP pedestrian scoring was compared with real-life injury outcomes in car-to-pedestrian and car-tobicyclist crashes occurring in Sweden. Approximately 1200 injured pedestrians and 2000 injured bicyclists were included in the study. Groups of cars with low, medium and high pedestrian scores were compared with respect to pedestrian injury severity on the Maximum Abbreviated Injury Scale (MAIS)-level and risk of permanent medical impairment (RPMI). Significant injury reductions to both pedestrians and bicyclists were found between low and high performing cars. For pedestrians, the reduction of MAIS2+, MAIS3+, RPMI1+ and RPMI10+ ranged from 20-56% and was significant on all levels except for MAIS3+ injuries. Pedestrian head injuries had the highest reduction, 80-90% depending on level of medical impairment. For bicyclist, an injury reduction was only observed between medium and high performing cars. Significant injury reductions were found for all body regions. It was also found that cars fitted with autonomous emergency braking including pedestrian detection might have a 60-70% lower crash involvement than expected. Based on these results, it was recommended that pedestrian protection are implemented on a global scale to provide protection for vulnerable road users worldwide.

Evaluating pedestrian safety improvements : final report.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2012-12-01

The purpose of the study was to evaluate the impact of new pedestrian countermeasure installations on pedestrian safety to assist in informing future pedestrian safety initiatives. In order to address these objectives, the WMU team conducted a litera...

2000 Metropolitan Bicycle and Pedestrian Plan

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2000-12-01

The Metropolitan Bicycle and Pedestrian Plan establishes a 20-year vision for bicycle and pedestrian facilities in the Fargo-Moorhead metropolitan area and its environs. It is the intent of the Metropolitan Bicycle and Pedestrian Committee, which gui...

Does facing traffic improve pedestrian safety?

PubMed

Luoma, Juha; Peltola, Harri

2013-01-01

This study was designed to evaluate the potential safety importance of the walking direction along a road by examining pedestrian accidents as a function of exposure to risk. The study was limited to rural two-lane roads with no pavement or pedestrian lane. The accident data included police-reported road accidents from Finland between 2006 and 2010 in which a motorized vehicle had struck a pedestrian walking along the road. There were 18 accidents involving a fatally injured pedestrian and 87 accidents involving a non-fatally injured pedestrian. The exposure data collected from the roughly 3400km included 258 pedestrians. The main finding was that the mean effect of facing traffic compared to walking with traffic was a 77% decrease in fatal and in non-fatal injury pedestrian accidents. The results further showed that the effects were greater for main roads than for secondary roads. The main implication of this study is that information about the importance of facing traffic should be reinforced with specific information about its substantial safety benefits. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Pedestrian safety in Australia

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1999-12-01

This report was one in a series of pedestrian safety synthesis reports prepared for the Federal Highway : Administration (FHWA) to document pedestrian safety in other countries. Reports are also available for: : United Kingdom (FHWA-RD-99-089) : Cana...

Special issue : pedestrian injuries:

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1999-03-13

This special issue focuses on effective ways to reduce pedestrian deaths and injuries. Pedestrians represent the second largest group of motor vehicle deaths, second only to passenger vehicle occupant deaths. This study examines some of the most effe...

Pedestrian safety in Sweden

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1999-12-01

This report was one in a series of pedestrian safety synthesis reports prepared for the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) to document pedestrian safety in other countries. Reports are also available for: : United Kingdom (FHWA-RD-99-089) : Canada...

Testing and evaluation of pedestrian sensors

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2007-09-01

The foundation for several pedestrian safety measures is reliable and accurate detection of pedestrians. The main objective of this study was to evaluate sensors for use in a pedestrian safety test bed in College Station, TX. The following sensors we...

Measuring pedestrian volumes and conflicts. Volume III, Measuring pedestrian volumes : a users manual

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1988-03-01

Users of the manual are expected to be in divisions responsible for pedestrian safety in cities, counties, and other jurisdictions. The users manual outlines a step-by-step procedure to measure pedestrian volumes using small count intervals. Appendix...

Pedestrian injury mitigation by autonomous braking.

PubMed

Rosén, Erik; Källhammer, Jan-Erik; Eriksson, Dick; Nentwich, Matthias; Fredriksson, Rikard; Smith, Kip

2010-11-01

The objective of this study was to calculate the potential effectiveness of a pedestrian injury mitigation system that autonomously brakes the car prior to impact. The effectiveness was measured by the reduction of fatally and severely injured pedestrians. The database from the German In-Depth Accident Study (GIDAS) was queried for pedestrians hit by the front of cars from 1999 to 2007. Case by case information on vehicle and pedestrian velocities and trajectories were analysed to estimate the field of view needed for a vehicle-based sensor to detect the pedestrians one second prior to the crash. The pre-impact braking system was assumed to activate the brakes one second prior to crash and to provide a braking deceleration up to the limit of the road surface conditions, but never to exceed 0.6 g. New impact speeds were then calculated for pedestrians that would have been detected by the sensor. These calculations assumed that all pedestrians who were within a given field of view but not obstructed by surrounding objects would be detected. The changes in fatality and severe injury risks were quantified using risk curves derived by logistic regression of the accident data. Summing the risks for all pedestrians, relationships between mitigation effectiveness, sensor field of view, braking initiation time, and deceleration were established. The study documents that the effectiveness at reducing fatally (severely) injured pedestrians in frontal collisions with cars reached 40% (27%) at a field of view of 40 degrees. Increasing the field of view further led to only marginal improvements in effectiveness. 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

How microglia kill neurons.

PubMed

Brown, Guy C; Vilalta, Anna

2015-12-02

Microglia are resident brain macrophages that become inflammatory activated in most brain pathologies. Microglia normally protect neurons, but may accidentally kill neurons when attempting to limit infections or damage, and this may be more common with degenerative disease as there was no significant selection pressure on the aged brain in the past. A number of mechanisms by which activated microglia kill neurons have been identified, including: (i) stimulation of the phagocyte NADPH oxidase (PHOX) to produce superoxide and derivative oxidants, (ii) expression of inducible nitric oxide synthase (iNOS) producing NO and derivative oxidants, (iii) release of glutamate and glutaminase, (iv) release of TNFα, (v) release of cathepsin B, (vi) phagocytosis of stressed neurons, and (vii) decreased release of nutritive BDNF and IGF-1. PHOX stimulation contributes to microglial activation, but is not directly neurotoxic unless NO is present. NO is normally neuroprotective, but can react with superoxide to produce neurotoxic peroxynitrite, or in the presence of hypoxia inhibit mitochondrial respiration. Glutamate can be released by glia or neurons, but is neurotoxic only if the neurons are depolarised, for example as a result of mitochondrial inhibition. TNFα is normally neuroprotective, but can become toxic if caspase-8 or NF-κB activation are inhibited. If the above mechanisms do not kill neurons, they may still stress the neurons sufficiently to make them susceptible to phagocytosis by activated microglia. We review here whether microglial killing of neurons is an artefact, makes evolutionary sense or contributes in common neuropathologies and by what mechanisms. This article is part of a Special Issue entitled SI: Neuroprotection. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Pedestrian Safer Journey

Science.gov Websites

Pedestrian Safer Journey Skills for Safe Walking for Ages 5 to 18 Use in the classroom or one-on -one. To start, click on an age group below: Ages 5-9 Ages 10-14 Ages 15-18 What is Pedestrian Safer get the conversation started with children and youth. Three videos - one for each of three age groups

Simulation of counterflow pedestrian dynamics using spheropolygons

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Alonso-Marroquín, Fernando; Busch, Jonathan; Chiew, Coraline; Lozano, Celia; Ramírez-Gómez, Álvaro

2014-12-01

Pedestrian dynamic models are typically designed for comfortable walking or slightly congested conditions and typically use a single disk or combination of three disks for the shape of a pedestrian. Under crowd conditions, a more accurate pedestrian shape has advantages over the traditional single or three-disks model. We developed a method for simulating pedestrian dynamics in a large dense crowd of spheropolygons adapted to the cross section of the chest and arms of a pedestrian. Our numerical model calculates pedestrian motion from Newton's second law, taking into account viscoelastic contact forces, contact friction, and ground-reaction forces. Ground-reaction torque was taken to arise solely from the pedestrians' orientation toward their preferred destination. Simulations of counterflow pedestrians dynamics in corridors were used to gain insight into a tragic incident at the Madrid Arena pavilion in Spain, where five girls were crushed to death. The incident took place at a Halloween Celebration in 2012, in a long, densely crowded hallway used as entrance and exit at the same time. Our simulations reconstruct the mechanism of clogging in the hallway. The hypothetical case of a total evacuation order was also investigated. The results highlights the importance of the pedestrians' density and the effect of counterflow in the onset of avalanches and clogging and provides an estimation of the number of injuries based on a calculation of the contact-force network between the pedestrians.

Simulation of counterflow pedestrian dynamics using spheropolygons.

PubMed

Alonso-Marroquín, Fernando; Busch, Jonathan; Chiew, Coraline; Lozano, Celia; Ramírez-Gómez, Álvaro

2014-12-01

Pedestrian dynamic models are typically designed for comfortable walking or slightly congested conditions and typically use a single disk or combination of three disks for the shape of a pedestrian. Under crowd conditions, a more accurate pedestrian shape has advantages over the traditional single or three-disks model. We developed a method for simulating pedestrian dynamics in a large dense crowd of spheropolygons adapted to the cross section of the chest and arms of a pedestrian. Our numerical model calculates pedestrian motion from Newton's second law, taking into account viscoelastic contact forces, contact friction, and ground-reaction forces. Ground-reaction torque was taken to arise solely from the pedestrians' orientation toward their preferred destination. Simulations of counterflow pedestrians dynamics in corridors were used to gain insight into a tragic incident at the Madrid Arena pavilion in Spain, where five girls were crushed to death. The incident took place at a Halloween Celebration in 2012, in a long, densely crowded hallway used as entrance and exit at the same time. Our simulations reconstruct the mechanism of clogging in the hallway. The hypothetical case of a total evacuation order was also investigated. The results highlights the importance of the pedestrians' density and the effect of counterflow in the onset of avalanches and clogging and provides an estimation of the number of injuries based on a calculation of the contact-force network between the pedestrians.

Cervical spine injuries in young children: pattern and outcomes in accidental versus inflicted trauma.

PubMed

Baerg, Joanne; Thirumoorthi, Arul; Hazboun, Rajaie; Vannix, Rosemary; Krafft, Paul; Zouros, Alexander

2017-11-01

The aim of the study was to compare the cervical spine (c-spine) pattern of injury and outcomes in children below 3 y with a head injury from confirmed inflicted versus accidental trauma. After Institutional Review Board approval, data were prospectively collected between July 2011 and January 2016. Inclusion criteria were age below 3 y, a loss of consciousness, and any one of the following initial head computed tomography (CT) findings (subdural hematoma, intraventricular, intraparenchymal, subarachnoid hemorrhage, or cerebral edema). A protocol of brain and neck magnetic resonance imaging and magnetic resonance angiography was instituted. Brain and neck imaging results, clinical variables, and outcomes were recorded. Data were compared by t-test for continuous and Fisher exact test for categorical variables. 73 children were identified, 52 (71%) with inflicted and 21 (29%) with accidental trauma. The median age was 11 mo; (range: 1-35 mo). Ten (14%) had c-spine injuries, 7/52 (13%) inflicted, and 3/21 (14%) accidental. The mechanism was shaking for all inflicted and motor vehicle accident or pedestrian struck for accidental c-spine injuries. The inflicted group were significantly younger (P = 0.03), had higher Injury Severity Scores (P = 0.02), subdural hematomas (P = 0.03), fractures (P = 0.03), retinal hemorrhages (P = 0.02), brain infarcts (P = 0.01), and required cardiopulmonary resuscitation (P = 0.01). Seven with inflicted trauma died from brain injury (9.5%), one had atlanto-occipital dissociation. Six mortalities (86%) had no c-spine injury. Six with inflicted c-spine injuries survived with neurologic impairment, whereas three with accidental survived without disability, including one atlanto-occipital dissociation. Compared to accidental trauma, young children with inflicted c-spine injuries have more multisystem trauma, long-term disability from brain injury, and an injury pattern consistent with shaking. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Inc

Detecting New Pedestrian Facilities from VGI Data Sources

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhong, S.; Xie, Z.

2017-12-01

Pedestrian facility (e.g. footbridge, pedestrian crossing and underground passage) information is an important basic data of location based service (LBS) for pedestrians. However, timely updating pedestrian facility information challenges due to facilities change frequently. Previous pedestrian facility information collecting and updating tasks are mainly completed by highly trained specialized persons. However, this conventional approach has several disadvantages such as high cost, long update cycle and so on. Volunteered Geographic Information (VGI) has proven efficiency to provide new, free and fast growing spatial data. Pedestrian trajectory, which can be seen as measurements of real pedestrian road, is one of the most valuable information of VGI data. Although the accuracy of the trajectories is not too high, due to the large number of measurements, an improvement of quality of the road information can be achieved. Thus, we develop a method for detecting new pedestrian facilities based on the current road network and pedestrian trajectories. Specifically, 1) by analyzing speed, distance and direction, those outliers of pedestrian trajectories are removed, 2) a road network matching algorithm is developed for eliminating redundant trajectories, and 3) a space-time cluster algorithm is adopted for detecting new walking facilities. The performance of the method is evaluated with a series of experiments conducted on a part of the road network of Heifei and a large number of real pedestrian trajectories, and verified the results by using Tencent Street map. The results show that the proposed method is able to detecting new pedestrian facilities from VGI data accurately. We believe that the proposed method provides an alternative way for general road data acquisition, and can improve the quality of LBS for pedestrians.

Visually Impaired Pedestrian Safety at Roundabout Crossings

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2017-11-01

Pedestrians are some of the most vulnerable road users. This becomes more apparent : at intersections, where pedestrians are unprotected and interacting with vehicles. While : pedestrian phases that are commonplace at most signalized intersections fa...

Automated Pedestrian Detection, Count and Analysis System

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2015-04-15

Pedestrian and bicycle count data is necessary for transportation planning, implementing safety countermeasures, and traffic management. This data is critical when evaluating the pedestrian level of service of safety (LOSS) and pedestrian safety perf...

Pedestrian recognition using automotive radar sensors

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bartsch, A.; Fitzek, F.; Rasshofer, R. H.

2012-09-01

The application of modern series production automotive radar sensors to pedestrian recognition is an important topic in research on future driver assistance systems. The aim of this paper is to understand the potential and limits of such sensors in pedestrian recognition. This knowledge could be used to develop next generation radar sensors with improved pedestrian recognition capabilities. A new raw radar data signal processing algorithm is proposed that allows deep insights into the object classification process. The impact of raw radar data properties can be directly observed in every layer of the classification system by avoiding machine learning and tracking. This gives information on the limiting factors of raw radar data in terms of classification decision making. To accomplish the very challenging distinction between pedestrians and static objects, five significant and stable object features from the spatial distribution and Doppler information are found. Experimental results with data from a 77 GHz automotive radar sensor show that over 95% of pedestrians can be classified correctly under optimal conditions, which is compareable to modern machine learning systems. The impact of the pedestrian's direction of movement, occlusion, antenna beam elevation angle, linear vehicle movement, and other factors are investigated and discussed. The results show that under real life conditions, radar only based pedestrian recognition is limited due to insufficient Doppler frequency and spatial resolution as well as antenna side lobe effects.

Second generation accessible pedestrian systems.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2014-09-01

The Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 has had a great impact on the implementation of Accessible Pedestrian Systems that target accessible and safety : impediments faced by pedestrians with mobility and visual impairments. Intersection geometri...

Towards an integrated approach of pedestrian behaviour and exposure.

PubMed

Papadimitriou, Eleonora

2016-07-01

In this paper, an integrated methodology for the analysis of pedestrian behaviour and exposure is proposed, allowing to identify and quantify the effect of pedestrian behaviour, road and traffic characteristics on pedestrian risk exposure, for each pedestrian and for populations of pedestrians. The paper builds on existing research on pedestrian exposure, namely the Routledge microscopic indicator, proposes adjustments to take into account road, traffic and human factors and extends the use of this indicator on area-wide level. Moreover, this paper uses integrated choice and latent variables (ICLV) models of pedestrian behaviour, taking into account road, traffic and human factors. Finally, a methodology is proposed for the integrated estimation of pedestrian behaviour and exposure on the basis of road, traffic and human factors. The method is tested with data from a field survey in Athens, Greece, which used pedestrian behaviour observations as well as a questionnaire on human factors of pedestrian behaviour. The data were used (i) to develop ICLV models of pedestrian behaviour and (ii) to estimate the behaviour and exposure of pedestrians for different road, traffic and behavioural scenarios. The results suggest that both pedestrian behaviour and exposure are largely defined by a small number of factors: road type, traffic volume and pedestrian risk-taking. The probability for risk-taking behaviour and the related exposure decrease in less demanding road and traffic environments. A synthesis of the results allows to enhance the understanding of the interactions between behaviour and exposure of pedestrians and to identify conditions of increased risk exposure. These conditions include principal urban arterials (where risk-taking behaviour is low but the related exposure is very high) and minor arterials (where risk-taking behaviour is more frequent, and the related exposure is still high). A "paradox" of increased risk-taking behaviour of pedestrians with low

Evaluation of pedestrian safety at intersections: A theoretical framework based on pedestrian-vehicle interaction patterns.

PubMed

Ni, Ying; Wang, Menglong; Sun, Jian; Li, Keping

2016-11-01

Pedestrians are the most vulnerable road users, and pedestrian safety has become a major research focus in recent years. Regarding the quality and quantity issues with collision data, conflict analysis using surrogate safety measures has become a useful method to study pedestrian safety. However, given the inequality between pedestrians and vehicles in encounters and the multiple interactions between pedestrians and vehicles, it is insufficient to simply use the same indicator(s) or the same way to aggregate indicators for all conditions. In addition, behavioral factors cannot be neglected. To better use information extracted from trajectories for safety evaluation and pay more attention on effects of behavioral factors, this paper develops a more sophisticated framework for pedestrian conflict analysis that takes pedestrian-vehicle interactions into consideration. A concept of three interaction patterns has been proposed for the first time, namely "hard interaction," "no interaction," and "soft-interaction." Interactions have been categorized under one of these patterns by analyzing profiles of speed and conflict indicators during the whole interactive processes. In this paper, a support vector machine (SVM) approach has been adopted to classify severity levels for a dataset including 1144 events extracted from three intersections in Shanghai, China, followed by an analysis of variable importance. The results revealed that different conflict indicators have different contributions to indicating the severity level under various interaction patterns. Therefore, it is recommended either to use specific conflict indicators or to use weighted indicator aggregation for each interaction pattern when evaluating pedestrian safety. The implementation has been carried out at the fourth crosswalk, and the results indicate that the proposed method can achieve a higher accuracy and better robustness than conventional methods. Furthermore, the method is helpful for better

Relationship between pedestrian headform tests and injury and fatality rates in vehicle-to-pedestrian crashes in the United States.

PubMed

Mueller, Becky; Farmer, Charles; Jermakian, Jessica; Zuby, David

2013-11-01

Pedestrian protection evaluations have been developed to encourage vehicle front-end designs that mitigate the consequences of vehicle-to-pedestrian crashes. The European New Car Assessment Program (Euro NCAP) evaluates pedestrian head protection with impacts against vehicle hood, windshield, and A-pillars. The Global Technical Regulation No. 9 (GTR 9), being evaluated for U.S. regulation, limits head protection evaluations to impacts against vehicle hoods. The objective of this study was to compare results from pedestrian head impact testing to the real-world rates of fatal and incapacitating injuries in U.S. pedestrian crashes. Data from police reported pedestrian crashes in 14 states were used to calculate real-world fatal and in- capacitating injury rates for seven 2002-07 small cars. Rates were 2.17-4.04 per 100 pedestrians struck for fatal injuries and 10.45-15.35 for incapacitating injuries. Euro NCAP style pedestrian headform tests were conducted against windshield, A-pillar, and hoods of the study vehicles. When compared with pedestrian injury rates, the vehicles' Euro NCAP scores, ranging 5-10 points, showed strong negative correlations (-0.6) to injury rates, though none were statistically significant. Data from the headform impacts for each of the study vehicles were used to calculate that vehicle's predicted serious injury risk. The predicted risks from both the Euro NCAP and GTR 9 test zones showed high positive correlations with the pedestrian fatal and incapacitating injury rates, though few were statistically significant. Whether vehicle stiffness is evaluated on all components of vehicle front ends (Euro NCAP) or is limited to hoods (GTR 9), softer vehicle components correspond to a lower risk of fatality.

Managing Pedestrian and Car Interactions

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2017-05-26

In urban areas and especially in inner cities, pedestrians crossing the road considerably influence the road traffic flow. For political (environmental) reasons, priority could be given to pedestrians. A larger number of crossings reduces the pedestr...

Pedestrian Friendly Traffic Signal Control.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2016-01-01

This project continues research aimed at real-time detection and use of pedestrian : traffic flow information to enhance adaptive traffic signal control in urban areas : where pedestrian traffic is substantial and must be given appropriate attention ...

Risks of pedestrian serious injuries and fatalities associated with impact velocities of cars in car-versus-pedestrian accidents in Japan.

PubMed

Matsui, Yasuhiro; Oikawa, Shoko; Ando, Kenichi

2013-11-01

The first purpose of this study is to clarify the relation between the car impact velocity and pedestrian injury severity or mortality risk. We investigated the frequency of serious injuries and fatalities of pedestrians using vehicle-pedestrian accident data from the database of the Institute for Traffic Accident Research and Data Analysis (ITARDA) in Japan. The vehicle types considered are sedans, minivans, and box vans (ordinary automobiles) and light passenger cars and light cargo vans (light automobiles). The results revealed that a 10-km/h reduction in impact velocity could mitigate severe pedestrian injuries in cases involving impact velocities of 40 km/h or more for the five vehicle types analyzed. Specifically, if the impact velocity was 30 km/h or less, the frequency of serious injuries was less than 27% and the frequency of fatalities was less than 5% for the five vehicle types. Therefore, if the collision damage mitigation braking system (CDMBS) that uses a sensor to detect pedestrians can effectively reduce the impact velocity for various vehicle types, pedestrian injuries will be greatly mitigated. The second purpose of this study is to identify the factors that affect injury risk. Impact experiments were conducted in which a sedan impacted against a pedestrian full-scale dummy at 40 km/h and a pedestrian headform impactor was impacted against a road surface. The results indicated that the risk of pedestrian serious injury was significantly affected by multiple impact conditions, such as the pedestrian height, car impact velocity, car frontal shape, and car stiffness in cases where the car impacted the pedestrian's head, the degrees of influence of which were driven by the vehicle impact velocity.

Psychological distance of pedestrian at the bus terminal area

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Firdaus Mohamad Ali, Mohd; Salleh Abustan, Muhamad; Hidayah Abu Talib, Siti; Abustan, Ismail; Rahman, Noorhazlinda Abd; Gotoh, Hitoshi

2018-03-01

Walking is a part of transportation modes that is effective for pedestrian in either short or long trips. All people are classified as pedestrian because people do walk every day and the higher number of people walking will lead to crowd conditions and that is the reason of the importance to study about the behaviour of pedestrian specifically the psychological distance in both indoor and outdoor. Nowadays, the number of studies of crowd dynamics among pedestrian have increased due to the concern about the safety issues primarily related to the emergency cases such as fire, earthquake, festival and etc. An observation of pedestrian was conducted at one of the main bus terminals in Kuala Lumpur with the main objective to obtain pedestrian psychological distance and it took place for 45 minutes by using a camcorder that was set up by using a tripod on the upper floor from the area of observation at the main lobby and the trapped area was approximately 100 m2. The analysis was focused on obtaining the gap between pedestrian based on two different categories, which are; (a) Pedestrian with relationship, and (b) Pedestrian without relationship. In total, 1,766 data were obtained during the analysis in which 561 data were obtained for `Pedestrian with relationship' and 1,205 data were obtained for "Pedestrian without relationship". Based on the obtained results, "Pedestrian without relationship" had shown a slightly higher average value of psychological distance between them compare to "Pedestrian with relationship" with the results of 1.6360m and 1.5909m respectively. In gender case, "Pedestrian without relationship" had higher mean of psychological distance in all three categories as well. Therefore, it can be concluded that pedestrian without relationship tend to have longer distance when walking in crowds.

Oregon bicycle and pedestrian plan

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1998-01-01

This bicycle and pedestrian plan for Oregon covers the following subjects and chapter headings: I-1. the importance of bicycling and walking; 2. state and federal laws relating to bicycle and pedestrian facilities; 3. current conditions for pedestria...

PHOTOVOICE: Reducing pedestrian injuries in children.

PubMed

Van Oss, Tracy; Quinn, Danielle; Viscosi, Pauline; Bretscher, Kristen

2013-01-01

Pedestrian injury is the second leading cause of injury related death for children. The purpose of this research project was to determine the effectiveness of pedestrian and road traffic safety education with children, as part of the Walk This Way program through Safe Kids USA. Through the implementation of PHOTOVOICE, a project that captured children's narratives coinciding with a photograph, children engaged in community exploration to identify pedestrian hazards in their communities and explore possible solutions utilizing their photography and narrations. Children participated in an engaging educational session, a community fieldtrip, and reflection. Results concluded that, despite a small increase in post test scores, an increase in awareness of hazards in the community and successful identification of community hazards was achieved. The goal of this research project was determine the effectiveness of a hands-on pedestrian and road traffic safety educational program with children. The results of this research project will be integrated with similar projects completed across the country through the program Walk This Way with Safe Kids USA. Both this research project and the Walk This Way program aim to promote behavior change in children and create safer communities to reduce pedestrian related injury. The overall goal of this research project andthe Walk This Way program is to increase education on a national level in regards to pedestrian safety for children and provide a basis for lobbying for public policy changes pertaining to road and pedestrian safety.

Multiple pedestrian detection using IR LED stereo camera

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ling, Bo; Zeifman, Michael I.; Gibson, David R. P.

2007-09-01

As part of the U.S. Department of Transportations Intelligent Vehicle Initiative (IVI) program, the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) is conducting R&D in vehicle safety and driver information systems. There is an increasing number of applications where pedestrian monitoring is of high importance. Visionbased pedestrian detection in outdoor scenes is still an open challenge. People dress in very different colors that sometimes blend with the background, wear hats or carry bags, and stand, walk and change directions unpredictably. The background is various, containing buildings, moving or parked cars, bicycles, street signs, signals, etc. Furthermore, existing pedestrian detection systems perform only during daytime, making it impossible to detect pedestrians at night. Under FHWA funding, we are developing a multi-pedestrian detection system using IR LED stereo camera. This system, without using any templates, detects the pedestrians through statistical pattern recognition utilizing 3D features extracted from the disparity map. A new IR LED stereo camera is being developed, which can help detect pedestrians during daytime and night time. Using the image differencing and denoising, we have also developed new methods to estimate the disparity map of pedestrians in near real time. Our system will have a hardware interface with the traffic controller through wireless communication. Once pedestrians are detected, traffic signals at the street intersections will change phases to alert the drivers of approaching vehicles. The initial test results using images collected at a street intersection show that our system can detect pedestrians in near real time.

Impact of grade separator on pedestrian risk taking behavior.

PubMed

Khatoon, Mariya; Tiwari, Geetam; Chatterjee, Niladri

2013-01-01

Pedestrians on Delhi roads are often exposed to high risks. This is because the basic needs of pedestrians are not recognized as a part of the urban transport infrastructure improvement projects in Delhi. Rather, an ever increasing number of cars and motorized two-wheelers encourage the construction of large numbers of flyovers/grade separators to facilitate signal free movement for motorized vehicles, exposing pedestrians to greater risk. This paper describes the statistical analysis of pedestrian risk taking behavior while crossing the road, before and after the construction of a grade separator at an intersection of Delhi. A significant number of pedestrians are willing to take risks in both before and after situations. The results indicate that absence of signals make pedestrians behave independently, leading to increased variability in their risk taking behavior. Variability in the speeds of all categories of vehicles has increased after the construction of grade separators. After the construction of the grade separator, the waiting time of pedestrians at the starting point of crossing has increased and the correlation between waiting times and gaps accepted by pedestrians show that after certain time of waiting, pedestrians become impatient and accepts smaller gap size to cross the road. A Logistic regression model is fitted by assuming that the probability of road crossing by pedestrians depends on the gap size (in s) between pedestrian and conflicting vehicles, sex, age, type of pedestrians (single or in a group) and type of conflicting vehicles. The results of Logistic regression explained that before the construction of the grade separator the probability of road crossing by the pedestrian depends on only the gap size parameter; however after the construction of the grade separator, other parameters become significant in determining pedestrian risk taking behavior. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Research of Pedestrian Crossing Safety Facilities Based on the Video Detection

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Li, Sheng-Zhen; Xie, Quan-Long; Zang, Xiao-Dong; Tang, Guo-Jun

Since that the pedestrian crossing facilities at present is not perfect, pedestrian crossing is in chaos and pedestrians from opposite direction conflict and congest with each other, which severely affects the pedestrian traffic efficiency, obstructs the vehicle and bringing about some potential security problems. To solve these problems, based on video identification, a pedestrian crossing guidance system was researched and designed. It uses the camera to monitor the pedestrians in real time and sums up the number of pedestrians through video detection program, and a group of pedestrian's induction lamp array is installed at the interval of crosswalk, which adjusts color display according to the proportion of pedestrians from both sides to guide pedestrians from both opposite directions processing separately. The emulation analysis result from cellular automaton shows that the system reduces the pedestrian crossing conflict, shortens the time of pedestrian crossing and improves the safety of pedestrians crossing.

Have pedestrian subsystem tests improved passenger car front shape?

PubMed

Li, Guibing; Wang, Fang; Otte, Dietmar; Cai, Zhihua; Simms, Ciaran

2018-06-01

Subsystem impactor tests are the main approaches for evaluation of safety performance of vehicle front design for pedestrian protection in legislative regulations. However, the main aspects of vehicle safety for pedestrians are shape and stiffness, and though it is clear that subsystem impact tests encourage lower vehicle front stiffness, it is unclear whether they promote improved vehicle front shapes for pedestrian protection. The purpose of this paper is therefore to investigate the effects of European pedestrian safety regulations on passenger car front shape and pedestrian injury risk using recent German In-Depth Accident Study (GIDAS) pedestrian collision data and numerical simulations. Firstly, a sample of 579 pedestrian collision cases involving 190 different car models between 2000-2015 extracted from the GIDAS was used to compare front-end shapes of passenger cars manufactured before and after the legislative pedestrian safety regulations were introduced in Europe. The focus was on changes in passenger car front shape and differences in pedestrian AIS2+ (Abbreviated Injury Scale at least level 2) leg, pelvis/femur and head injury risk observed in collisions. Multi-body simulations were also used to assess changes in vehicle aggressivity due to the observed changes in vehicle shape. The results show that newer passenger cars tend to have a flatter and wider bumper, higher bonnet leading edge, shorter and steeper bonnet and a shallower windscreen. Both the collision data and the numerical simulations indicate that newer passenger car front bumper designs are significantly safer for pedestrians' legs. However, the results also show that the higher bonnet leading edge in newer passenger cars is poor for pedestrian pelvis/femur protection, even though newer cars show an obviously lower AIS2+ injury risk to younger pedestrians in collisions. Newer cars have a lower AIS2+ head injury risk for pedestrians in collisions, but the numerical analysis indicate that

Analyzing pedestrian crash injury severity under different weather conditions.

PubMed

Li, Duo; Ranjitkar, Prakash; Zhao, Yifei; Yi, Hui; Rashidi, Soroush

2017-05-19

Pedestrians are the most vulnerable road users due to the lack of mass, speed, and protection compared to other types of road users. Adverse weather conditions may reduce road friction and visibility and thus increase crash risk. There is limited evidence and considerable discrepancy with regard to impacts of weather conditions on injury severity in the literature. This article investigated factors affecting pedestrian injury severity level under different weather conditions based on a publicly available accident database in Great Britain. Accident data from Great Britain that are publicly available through the STATS19 database were analyzed. Factors associated with pedestrian, driver, and environment were investigated using a novel approach that combines a classification and regression tree with random forest approach. Significant severity predictors under fine weather conditions from the models included speed limits, pedestrian age, light conditions, and vehicle maneuver. Under adverse weather conditions, the significant predictors were pedestrian age, vehicle maneuver, and speed limit. Elderly pedestrians are associated with higher pedestrian injury severities. Higher speed limits increase pedestrian injury severity. Based on the research findings, recommendations are provided to improve pedestrian safety.

Guide for Maintaining Pedestrian Facilities for Enhanced Safety.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2013-10-01

A Guide for Maintaining Pedestrian Facilities for Enhanced Safety provides guidance for maintaining pedestrian facilities with the primary goal of increasing safety and mobility. The Guide addresses the needs for pedestrian facility maintenance; comm...

Jamming transitions induced by an attraction in pedestrian flow.

PubMed

Kwak, Jaeyoung; Jo, Hang-Hyun; Luttinen, Tapio; Kosonen, Iisakki

2017-08-01

We numerically study jamming transitions in pedestrian flow interacting with an attraction, mostly based on the social force model for pedestrians who can join the attraction. We formulate the joining probability as a function of social influence from others, reflecting that individual choice behavior is likely influenced by others. By controlling pedestrian influx and the social influence parameter, we identify various pedestrian flow patterns. For the bidirectional flow scenario, we observe a transition from the free flow phase to the freezing phase, in which oppositely walking pedestrians reach a complete stop and block each other. On the other hand, a different transition behavior appears in the unidirectional flow scenario, i.e., from the free flow phase to the localized jam phase and then to the extended jam phase. It is also observed that the extended jam phase can end up in freezing phenomena with a certain probability when pedestrian flux is high with strong social influence. This study highlights that attractive interactions between pedestrians and an attraction can trigger jamming transitions by increasing the number of conflicts among pedestrians near the attraction. In order to avoid excessive pedestrian jams, we suggest suppressing the number of conflicts under a certain level by moderating pedestrian influx especially when the social influence is strong.

Jamming transitions induced by an attraction in pedestrian flow

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kwak, Jaeyoung; Jo, Hang-Hyun; Luttinen, Tapio; Kosonen, Iisakki

2017-08-01

We numerically study jamming transitions in pedestrian flow interacting with an attraction, mostly based on the social force model for pedestrians who can join the attraction. We formulate the joining probability as a function of social influence from others, reflecting that individual choice behavior is likely influenced by others. By controlling pedestrian influx and the social influence parameter, we identify various pedestrian flow patterns. For the bidirectional flow scenario, we observe a transition from the free flow phase to the freezing phase, in which oppositely walking pedestrians reach a complete stop and block each other. On the other hand, a different transition behavior appears in the unidirectional flow scenario, i.e., from the free flow phase to the localized jam phase and then to the extended jam phase. It is also observed that the extended jam phase can end up in freezing phenomena with a certain probability when pedestrian flux is high with strong social influence. This study highlights that attractive interactions between pedestrians and an attraction can trigger jamming transitions by increasing the number of conflicts among pedestrians near the attraction. In order to avoid excessive pedestrian jams, we suggest suppressing the number of conflicts under a certain level by moderating pedestrian influx especially when the social influence is strong.

Fatality rate of pedestrians and fatal crash involvement rate of drivers in pedestrian crashes: a case study of Iran.

PubMed

Kashani, Ali Tavakoli; Besharati, Mohammad Mehdi

2017-06-01

The aim of this study was to uncover patterns of pedestrian crashes. In the first stage, 34,178 pedestrian-involved crashes occurred in Iran during a four-year period were grouped into homogeneous clusters using a clustering analysis. Next, some in-cluster and inter-cluster crash patterns were analysed. The clustering analysis yielded six pedestrian crash groups. Car/van/pickup crashes on rural roads as well as heavy vehicle crashes were found to be less frequent but more likely to be fatal compared to other crash clusters. In addition, after controlling for crash frequency in each cluster, it was found that the fatality rate of each pedestrian age group as well as the fatal crash involvement rate of each driver age group varies across the six clusters. Results of present study has some policy implications including, promoting pedestrian safety training sessions for heavy vehicle drivers, imposing limitations over elderly heavy vehicle drivers, reinforcing penalties toward under 19 drivers and motorcyclists. In addition, road safety campaigns in rural areas may be promoted to inform people about the higher fatality rate of pedestrians on rural roads. The crash patterns uncovered in this study might also be useful for prioritizing future pedestrian safety research areas.

The Safety of Older Pedestrians at Signal-Controlled Crossings.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Harrell, W. Andrew

1996-01-01

Observes the extent to which pedestrians checked for oncoming traffic before crossing signal-controlled intersections on busy city streets. Pedestrians over the age of 50 were the most cautious, especially under dangerous traffic conditions. Older pedestrians were least likely to use other pedestrians as "guides" to safety, instead…

Does Excessive Daytime Sleepiness Affect Children's Pedestrian Safety?

PubMed Central

Avis, Kristin T.; Gamble, Karen L.; Schwebel, David C.

2014-01-01

Study Objectives: Many cognitive factors contribute to unintentional pedestrian injury, including reaction time, impulsivity, risk-taking, attention, and decision-making. These same factors are negatively influenced by excessive daytime sleepiness (EDS), which may place children with EDS at greater risk for pedestrian injury. Design, Participants, and Methods: Using a case-control design, 33 children age 8 to 16 y with EDS from an established diagnosis of narcolepsy or idiopathic hypersomnia (IHS) engaged in a virtual reality pedestrian environment while unmedicated. Thirty-three healthy children matched by age, race, sex, and household income served as controls. Results: Children with EDS were riskier pedestrians than healthy children. They were twice as likely to be struck by a virtual vehicle in the virtual pedestrian environment than healthy controls. Attentional skills of looking at oncoming traffic were not impaired among children with EDS, but decision-making for when to cross the street safely was significantly impaired. Conclusions: Results suggest excessive daytime sleepiness (EDS) from the clinical sleep disorders known as the hypersomnias of central origin may have significant consequences on children's daytime functioning in a critical domain of personal safety, pedestrian skills. Cognitive processes involved in safe pedestrian crossings may be impaired in children with EDS. In the pedestrian simulation, children with EDS appeared to show a pattern consistent with inattentional blindness, in that they “looked but did not process” information in their pedestrian environment. Results highlight the need for heightened awareness of potentially irreversible consequences of untreated sleep disorders and identify a possible target for pediatric injury prevention. Citation: Avis KT; Gamble KL; Schwebel DC. Does excessive daytime sleepiness affect children's pedestrian safety? SLEEP 2014;37(2):283-287. PMID:24497656

Does excessive daytime sleepiness affect children's pedestrian safety?

PubMed

Avis, Kristin T; Gamble, Karen L; Schwebel, David C

2014-02-01

Many cognitive factors contribute to unintentional pedestrian injury, including reaction time, impulsivity, risk-taking, attention, and decision-making. These same factors are negatively influenced by excessive daytime sleepiness (EDS), which may place children with EDS at greater risk for pedestrian injury. Using a case-control design, 33 children age 8 to 16 y with EDS from an established diagnosis of narcolepsy or idiopathic hypersomnia (IHS) engaged in a virtual reality pedestrian environment while unmedicated. Thirty-three healthy children matched by age, race, sex, and household income served as controls. Children with EDS were riskier pedestrians than healthy children. They were twice as likely to be struck by a virtual vehicle in the virtual pedestrian environment than healthy controls. Attentional skills of looking at oncoming traffic were not impaired among children with EDS, but decision-making for when to cross the street safely was significantly impaired. Results suggest excessive daytime sleepiness (EDS) from the clinical sleep disorders known as the hypersomnias of central origin may have significant consequences on children's daytime functioning in a critical domain of personal safety, pedestrian skills. Cognitive processes involved in safe pedestrian crossings may be impaired in children with EDS. In the pedestrian simulation, children with EDS appeared to show a pattern consistent with inattentional blindness, in that they "looked but did not process" information in their pedestrian environment. Results highlight the need for heightened awareness of potentially irreversible consequences of untreated sleep disorders and identify a possible target for pediatric injury prevention.

Pedestrian hybrid beacon guide : recommendations and case study.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2014-01-01

A pedestrian hybrid beacon (PHB) is a traffic control : device similar to a European pedestrian signal : (PELICAN) that was imported to the US and adapted by : engineers in Arizona to increase motorists awareness of : pedestrian crossings at uncon...

Experimental characterization of collision avoidance in pedestrian dynamics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Parisi, Daniel R.; Negri, Pablo A.; Bruno, Luciana

2016-08-01

In the present paper, the avoidance behavior of pedestrians was characterized by controlled experiments. Several conflict situations were studied considering different flow rates and group sizes in crossing and head-on configurations. Pedestrians were recorded from above, and individual two-dimensional trajectories of their displacement were recovered after image processing. Lateral swaying amplitude and step lengths were measured for free pedestrians, obtaining similar values to the ones reported in the literature. Minimum avoidance distances were computed in two-pedestrian experiments. In the case of one pedestrian dodging an arrested one, the avoidance distance did not depend on the relative orientation of the still pedestrian with respect to the direction of motion of the first. When both pedestrians were moving, the avoidance distance in a perpendicular encounter was longer than the one obtained during a head-on approach. It was found that the mean curvature of the trajectories was linearly anticorrelated with the mean speed. Furthermore, two common avoidance maneuvers, stopping and steering, were defined from the analysis of the acceleration and curvature in single trajectories. Interestingly, it was more probable to observe steering events than stopping ones, also the probability of simultaneous steering and stopping occurrences was negligible. The results obtained in this paper can be used to validate and calibrate pedestrian dynamics models.

Dual effects of pedestrian density on emergency evacuation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ma, Yi; Lee, Eric Wai Ming; Yuen, Richard Kwok Kit

2017-02-01

This paper investigates the effect of the pedestrian density in building on the evacuation dynamic with simulation method. In the simulations, both the visibility in building and the exit limit of building are taken into account. The simulation results show that the effect of the pedestrian density in building on the evacuation dynamics is dual. On the one hand, when the visibility in building is very large, the increased pedestrian density plays a negative effect. On the other hand, when the visibility in building is very small, the increased pedestrian density can play a positive effect. The simulation results also show that when both the exit width and visibility are very small, the varying of evacuation time with regard to the pedestrian density is non-monotonous and presents a U-shaped tendency. That is, in this case, too large or too small pedestrian density in building is disadvantageous to the evacuation process. Our findings provide a new insight about the effect of the pedestrian density in building on the evacuation dynamic.

Pedestrian and bicycle accommodations on superstreets.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2014-01-01

The objective of this research was to consider the unique challenges for pedestrians and bicyclists at superstreet intersections and : recommend crossing alternatives for both users. For pedestrians the options included the diagonal cross, median cro...

Effects of Pedestrian Prompts on Motorist Yielding at Crosswalks

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Crowley-Koch, Brian J.; Van Houten, Ron; Lim, Eunyoung

2011-01-01

Pedestrian safety is a serious concern at busy intersections and pedestrian campuses across the nation. Although crosswalks and signs inform pedestrians where to cross, there is no standard protocol for pedestrians to signal drivers that they wish to use the crosswalks, except to stand in or at the crosswalk. We examined the effects of two…

An Algorithm for Pedestrian Detection in Multispectral Image Sequences

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kniaz, V. V.; Fedorenko, V. V.

2017-05-01

The growing interest for self-driving cars provides a demand for scene understanding and obstacle detection algorithms. One of the most challenging problems in this field is the problem of pedestrian detection. Main difficulties arise from a diverse appearances of pedestrians. Poor visibility conditions such as fog and low light conditions also significantly decrease the quality of pedestrian detection. This paper presents a new optical flow based algorithm BipedDetet that provides robust pedestrian detection on a single-borad computer. The algorithm is based on the idea of simplified Kalman filtering suitable for realization on modern single-board computers. To detect a pedestrian a synthetic optical flow of the scene without pedestrians is generated using slanted-plane model. The estimate of a real optical flow is generated using a multispectral image sequence. The difference of the synthetic optical flow and the real optical flow provides the optical flow induced by pedestrians. The final detection of pedestrians is done by the segmentation of the difference of optical flows. To evaluate the BipedDetect algorithm a multispectral dataset was collected using a mobile robot.

Effectiveness and efficiencies in pedestrian safety.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1982-03-01

Pedestrian fatalities constitute 16 percent of total highway - related fatalities. Excluding motor vehicle occupants, pedestrians comprise the target single category of fatalities on the nation's streets and highways. A total of 85 percent of ! all p...

Warrants for pedestrian over and underpasses

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1984-07-01

The purpose of this research was to develop warrants for pedestrian over and underpasses or grade separated pedestrian crossings (GSPCs). Currently there are no established nationally acceptable warrants to serve as standards in deciding whether or n...

1995 Bicycle and Pedestrian Safety Report

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1995-03-01

This report provides a review of the current data on bicycle and pedestrian : safety across the United States, finding that safety and education : programs could significantly improve bicycle and pedestrian safety in the : Dallas-Fort Worth Metropoli...

Pedestrian-driver communication and decision strategies at marked crossings.

PubMed

Sucha, Matus; Dostal, Daniel; Risser, Ralf

2017-05-01

The aim of this work is to describe pedestrian-driver encounters, communication, and decision strategies at marked but unsignalised crossings in urban areas in the Czech Republic and the ways in which the parties involved experience and handle these encounters. A mixed-methods design was used, consisting of focus groups with pedestrians and drivers regarding their subjective views of the situations, on-site observations, camera recordings, speed measurements, the measurement of car and pedestrian densities, and brief on-site interviews with pedestrians. In close correspondence with the literature, our study revealed that the most relevant predictors of pedestrians' and drivers' behaviour at crossings were the densities of car traffic and pedestrian flows and car speed. The factors which influenced pedestrians' wait/go behaviour were: car speed, the distance of the car from the crossing, traffic density, whether there were cars approaching from both directions, various signs given by the driver (eye contact, waving a hand, flashing their lights), and the presence of other pedestrians. The factors influencing drivers' yield/go behaviour were: speed, traffic density, the number of pedestrians waiting to cross, and pedestrians being distracted. A great proportion of drivers (36%) failed to yield to pedestrians at marked crossings. The probability of conflict situations increased with cars travelling at a higher speed, higher traffic density, and pedestrians being distracted by a different activity while crossing. The findings of this study can add to the existing literature by helping to provide an understanding of the perception of encounter situations by the parties involved and the motives lying behind certain aspects of behaviour associated with these encounters. This seems necessary in order to develop suggestions for improvements. For instance, the infrastructure near pedestrian crossings should be designed in such a way as to take proper account of pedestrians

Pedestrian Injury Patterns According to Car and Casualty Characteristics in France

PubMed Central

Martin, Jean-Louis; Lardy, Audrey; Laumon, Bernard

2011-01-01

This paper describes the injury patterns of pedestrians involved in collisions with cars, compares them with other road casualties and estimates the possible effect of car front profile on injury location. Injury patterns were identified using the Rhône Road Trauma Registry which covers all the casualties resulting from crashes in the Rhône Département (1.6 million inhabitants) who seek medical care in health facilities. Fatality rates were estimated from national police reports for the same years (1996–2007), and the two data sources were linked to obtain information on the front profile of the striking car. As with all groups of road users, most of the pedestrians involved in car crashes were young. However elderly people were overrepresented when the size of the exposed population was taken into account. The most frequently injured body regions were the lower extremities (50% of victims), the head/face/neck (38%) and the upper extremities (27%). Pelvic injuries were much more common for women. The most severe injuries (AIS4+) were mostly to the head and thorax, for all groups of road users. However, pedestrians sustained twice as many head injuries as thoracic injuries. When the front profiles were grouped together according to the most common car types in Europe, the risk of being killed was higher for MPVs. More specifically, the risk of sustaining an AIS2+ thoracic injury was higher in a collision with an MPV. Our study confirms that it is quite justified for the tests based on European Enhanced Vehicle-Safety Committee guidelines to be focused on the head and the lower extremities. However, no test procedure exists for thoracic injuries, which is the body region with the second highest number of severe or fatal injuries. PMID:22105391

Pedestrian detection based on redundant wavelet transform

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Huang, Lin; Ji, Liping; Hu, Ping; Yang, Tiejun

2016-10-01

Intelligent video surveillance is to analysis video or image sequences captured by a fixed or mobile surveillance camera, including moving object detection, segmentation and recognition. By using it, we can be notified immediately in an abnormal situation. Pedestrian detection plays an important role in an intelligent video surveillance system, and it is also a key technology in the field of intelligent vehicle. So pedestrian detection has very vital significance in traffic management optimization, security early warn and abnormal behavior detection. Generally, pedestrian detection can be summarized as: first to estimate moving areas; then to extract features of region of interest; finally to classify using a classifier. Redundant wavelet transform (RWT) overcomes the deficiency of shift variant of discrete wavelet transform, and it has better performance in motion estimation when compared to discrete wavelet transform. Addressing the problem of the detection of multi-pedestrian with different speed, we present an algorithm of pedestrian detection based on motion estimation using RWT, combining histogram of oriented gradients (HOG) and support vector machine (SVM). Firstly, three intensities of movement (IoM) are estimated using RWT and the corresponding areas are segmented. According to the different IoM, a region proposal (RP) is generated. Then, the features of a RP is extracted using HOG. Finally, the features are fed into a SVM trained by pedestrian databases and the final detection results are gained. Experiments show that the proposed algorithm can detect pedestrians accurately and efficiently.

Pedestrian injury causation parameters. Phase 2

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1981-10-01

This report describes data collection, quality control and data analysis procedures for a five-team program to study pedestrian injury causation factors. The data file contains 1,997 pedestrian accidents collected during a two and one-half year perio...

Mean-field theory for pedestrian outflow through an exit.

PubMed

Yanagisawa, Daichi; Nishinari, Katsuhiro

2007-12-01

The average pedestrian flow through an exit is one of the most important indices in evaluating pedestrian dynamics. In order to study the flow in detail, the floor field model, which is a crowd model using cellular automata, is extended by taking into account realistic behavior of pedestrians around the exit. The model is studied by both numerical simulations and cluster analysis to obtain a theoretical expression for the average pedestrian flow through the exit. It is found quantitatively that the effects of exit door width, the wall, and the pedestrian mood of competition or cooperation significantly influence the average flow. The results show that there is a suitable width and position of the exit according to the pedestrians' mood.

Evaluation of geometrically personalized THUMS pedestrian model response against sedan-pedestrian PMHS impact test data.

PubMed

Chen, Huipeng; Poulard, David; Forman, Jason; Crandall, Jeff; Panzer, Matthew B

2018-07-04

Evaluating the biofidelity of pedestrian finite element models (PFEM) using postmortem human subjects (PMHS) is a challenge because differences in anthropometry between PMHS and PFEM could limit a model's capability to accurately capture cadaveric responses. Geometrical personalization via morphing can modify the PFEM geometry to match the specific PMHS anthropometry, which could alleviate this issue. In this study, the Total Human Model for Safety (THUMS) PFEM (Ver 4.01) was compared to the cadaveric response in vehicle-pedestrian impacts using geometrically personalized models. The AM50 THUMS PFEM was used as the baseline model, and 2 morphed PFEM were created to the anthropometric specifications of 2 obese PMHS used in a previous pedestrian impact study with a mid-size sedan. The same measurements as those obtained during the PMHS tests were calculated from the simulations (kinematics, accelerations, strains), and biofidelity metrics based on signals correlation (correlation and analysis, CORA) were established to compare the response of the models to the experiments. Injury outcomes were predicted deterministically (through strain-based threshold) and probabilistically (with injury risk functions) and compared with the injuries reported in the necropsy. The baseline model could not accurately capture all aspects of the PMHS kinematics, strain, and injury risks, whereas the morphed models reproduced biofidelic response in terms of trajectory (CORA score = 0.927 ± 0.092), velocities (0.975 ± 0.027), accelerations (0.862 ± 0.072), and strains (0.707 ± 0.143). The personalized THUMS models also generally predicted injuries consistent with those identified during posttest autopsy. The study highlights the need to control for pedestrian anthropometry when validating pedestrian human body models against PMHS data. The information provided in the current study could be useful for improving model biofidelity for vehicle-pedestrian impact scenarios.

14 CFR 139.329 - Pedestrians and ground vehicles.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-01-01

... 14 Aeronautics and Space 3 2013-01-01 2013-01-01 false Pedestrians and ground vehicles. 139.329... OF AIRPORTS Operations § 139.329 Pedestrians and ground vehicles. In a manner authorized by the... pedestrians and ground vehicles necessary for airport operations; (b) Establish and implement procedures for...

14 CFR 139.329 - Pedestrians and ground vehicles.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-01-01

... 14 Aeronautics and Space 3 2011-01-01 2011-01-01 false Pedestrians and ground vehicles. 139.329... OF AIRPORTS Operations § 139.329 Pedestrians and ground vehicles. In a manner authorized by the... pedestrians and ground vehicles necessary for airport operations; (b) Establish and implement procedures for...

Evaluating the Safety In Numbers effect for pedestrians at urban intersections.

PubMed

Murphy, Brendan; Levinson, David M; Owen, Andrew

2017-09-01

Assessment of collision risk between pedestrians and automobiles offers a powerful and informative tool in urban planning applications, and can be leveraged to inform proper placement of improvements and treatment projects to improve pedestrian safety. Such assessment can be performed using existing datasets of crashes, pedestrian counts, and automobile traffic flows to identify intersections or corridors characterized by elevated collision risks to pedestrians. The Safety In Numbers phenomenon, which refers to the observable effect that pedestrian safety is positively correlated with increased pedestrian traffic in a given area (i.e. that the individual per-pedestrian risk of a collision decreases with additional pedestrians), is a readily observed phenomenon that has been studied previously, though its directional causality is not yet known. A sample of 488 intersections in Minneapolis were analyzed, and statistically-significant log-linear relationships between pedestrian traffic flows and the per-pedestrian crash risk were found, indicating the Safety In Numbers effect. Potential planning applications of this analysis framework towards improving pedestrian safety in urban environments are discussed. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Features of the Vision of Elderly Pedestrians when Crossing a Road.

PubMed

Matsui, Yasuhiro; Oikawa, Shoko; Aoki, Yoshio; Sekine, Michiaki; Mitobe, Kazutaka

2014-11-01

The present study clarifies the mechanism by which an accident occurs when an elderly pedestrian crosses a road in front of a car, focusing on features of the central and peripheral vision of elderly pedestrians who are judging when it is safe to cross the road. For the pedestrian's central visual field, we investigated the effect of age on the timing judgment using an actual car. The results for daytime conditions indicate that the elderly pedestrians tended to make later judgments of when they crossed the road from the right side of the driver's view at high car velocities. At night, for a car with its headlights on high beam, the average car-pedestrian distances of elderly pedestrians on the left side of the driver's view were significantly longer than those of young pedestrians at velocities of 20 and 40 km/h. The eyesight of the elderly pedestrians during the day did not affect the timing judgment of crossing a road. At night, for a car with its headlights on either high or low beam, the average car-pedestrian distances of elderly pedestrians having good eyesight were longer than those of elderly pedestrians having poor eyesight, for all car velocities. The color of the car body in the central visual field did not affect the timing judgment of elderly pedestrians crossing the road. Meanwhile, the car-body color in the elderly pedestrian's peripheral vision strongly affected the pedestrian's awareness of the car.

The correlation between pedestrian injury severity in real-life crashes and Euro NCAP pedestrian test results.

PubMed

Strandroth, Johan; Rizzi, Matteo; Sternlund, Simon; Lie, Anders; Tingvall, Claes

2011-12-01

The aim of the present study was to estimate the correlation between Euro NCAP pedestrian rating scores and injury outcome in real-life car-to-pedestrian crashes, with special focus on long-term disability. Another aim was to determine whether brake assist (BA) systems affect the injury outcome in real-life car-to-pedestrian crashes and to estimate the combined effects in injury reduction of a high Euro NCAP ranking score and BA. In the current study, the Euro NCAP pedestrian scoring was compared with the real-life outcome in pedestrian crashes that occurred in Sweden during 2003 to 2010. The real-life crash data were obtained from the data acquisition system Swedish Traffic Accident Data Acquisition (STRADA), which combines police records and hospital admission data. The medical data consisted of International Classification of Diseases (ICD) diagnoses and Abbreviated Injury Scale (AIS) scoring. In all, approximately 500 pedestrians submitted to hospital were included in the study. Each car model was coded according to Euro NCAP pedestrian scores. In addition, the presence or absence of BA was coded for each car involved. Cars were grouped according to their scoring. Injury outcomes were analyzed with AIS and, at the victim level, with permanent medical impairment. This was done by translating the injury scores for each individual to the risk of serious consequences (RSC) at 1, 5, and 10 percent risk of disability level. This indicates the total risk of a medical disability for each victim, given the severity and location of injuries. The mean RSC (mRSC) was then calculated for each car group and t-tests were conducted to falsify the null hypothesis at p ≤ .05 that the mRSC within the groups was equal. The results showed a significant reduction of injury severity for cars with better pedestrian scoring, although cars with a high score could not be studied due to lack of cases. The reduction in RSC for medium-performing cars in comparison with low-performing cars

Elderly Pedestrian Safety and Driver Distractions

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2015-12-16

About two-thirds of pedestrian fatalities in Maine involve people crossing urban streets or rural roads. Therefore, providing safe sidewalks is not a cure-all even if that is what many pedestrians ask for. We also need to improve safety at crosswalks...

Highway Safety Program Manual: Volume 14: Pedestrian Safety.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (DOT), Washington, DC.

Volume 14 of the 19-volume Highway Safety Program Manual (which provides guidance to State and local governments on preferred highway safety practices) concentrates on pedestrian safety. The purpose and objectives of a pedestrian safety program are outlined. Federal authority in the area of pedestrian safety and policies regarding a safety program…

Comprehensive study to reduce pedestrian crashes in Florida : [summary].

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2013-12-01

Pedestrian crashes are a major safety : concern in Florida, with about one in : every ve traf c fatalities involving a : pedestrian. Recently, researchers at : Florida International University studied : ways to improve pedestrian safety on : F...

Pedestrians' crossing behaviors and safety at unmarked roadway in China.

PubMed

Zhuang, Xiangling; Wu, Changxu

2011-11-01

Pedestrians' crossing out of crosswalks (unmarked roadway) contributed to many traffic accidents, but existing pedestrian studies mainly focus on crosswalk crossing in developed countries specifically. Field observation of 254 pedestrians at unmarked roadway in China showed that 65.7% of them did not look for vehicles after arriving at the curb. Those who did look and pay attention to the traffic did so for duration of time that followed an exponential distribution. Pedestrians preferred crossing actively in tentative ways rather than waiting passively. The waiting time at the curb, at the median, and at the roadway all followed exponential distributions. During crossing, all pedestrians looked at the oncoming vehicles. When interacting with these vehicles, 31.9% of them ran and 11.4% stepped backwards. Running pedestrians usually began running at the borderline rather than within the lanes. Pedestrians preferred safe to short paths and they crossed second half of the road with significantly higher speed. These behavioral patterns were rechecked at an additional site with 105 pedestrians and the results showed much accordance. In terms of safety, pedestrians who were middle aged, involved in bigger groups, looked at vehicles more often before crossing or interacted with buses rather than cars were safer while those running were more dangerous. Potential applications of these findings, including building accurate simulation models of pedestrians and education of drivers and pedestrians in developing countries were also discussed. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

A case of accidental fatal aluminum phosphide poisoning involving humans and dogs.

PubMed

Behera, Chittaranjan; Krishna, Karthik; Bhardwaj, Daya Nand; Rautji, Ravi; Kumar, Arvind

2015-05-01

Aluminum phosphide is one of the commonest poisons encountered in agricultural areas, and manner of death in the victims is often suicidal and rarely homicidal or accidental. This paper presents an unusual case, where two humans (owner and housemaid) and eight dogs were found dead in the morning hours inside a room of a house, used as shelter for stray dogs. There was allegation by the son of the owner that his father had been killed. Crime scene visit by forensic pathologists helped to collect vital evidence. Autopsies of both the human victims and the dogs were conducted. Toxicological analysis of viscera, vomitus, leftover food, and chemical container at the crime scene tested positive for aluminum phosphide. The cause of death in both humans and dogs was aluminum phosphide poisoning. Investigation by police and the forensic approach to the case helped in ascertaining the manner of death, which was accidental. © 2015 American Academy of Forensic Sciences.

Impact of Transit Stop Location on Pedestrian Safety [Summary

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2017-11-01

Pedestrians can be vulnerable in many roadway situations so pedestrian safety and reducing pedestrian collisions are always a high priority for the Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT). As more people use public transportation to get from home...

Pedestrian Detection by Laser Scanning and Depth Imagery

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Barsi, A.; Lovas, T.; Molnar, B.; Somogyi, A.; Igazvolgyi, Z.

2016-06-01

Pedestrian flow is much less regulated and controlled compared to vehicle traffic. Estimating flow parameters would support many safety, security or commercial applications. Current paper discusses a method that enables acquiring information on pedestrian movements without disturbing and changing their motion. Profile laser scanner and depth camera have been applied to capture the geometry of the moving people as time series. Procedures have been developed to derive complex flow parameters, such as count, volume, walking direction and velocity from laser scanned point clouds. Since no images are captured from the faces of pedestrians, no privacy issues raised. The paper includes accuracy analysis of the estimated parameters based on video footage as reference. Due to the dense point clouds, detailed geometry analysis has been conducted to obtain the height and shoulder width of pedestrians and to detect whether luggage has been carried or not. The derived parameters support safety (e.g. detecting critical pedestrian density in mass events), security (e.g. detecting prohibited baggage in endangered areas) and commercial applications (e.g. counting pedestrians at all entrances/exits of a shopping mall).

New insights into turbulent pedestrian movement pattern in crowd-quakes

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ma, J.; Song, W. G.; Lo, S. M.; Fang, Z. M.

2013-02-01

Video recordings right before the Love Parade disaster have been quantitatively analyzed to explore the bursts of unusual crowd movement patterns, crowd-quakes. The pedestrian movement pattern in this incident was special for the reason that it happened in a congested counter flow scenario, where stopped pedestrians were involved. No one was believed to have pushed others intentionally at the beginning, however, under this situation, the body contacts among the pedestrians still induced a force spread, which then led to velocity fluctuation. As indicated by the individual velocity-related features, the densely crowded pedestrian movement displayed turbulent flow features. Further analyzing the overall flow field, we also found that the pedestrian flow field shared typical patterns with turbulent fluid flow. As a result of the turbulent state, different clusters of pedestrians displayed different velocity features. Thus crowd pressure which took into account the velocity and density information was proved to be a good indicator of crowd disasters. Based on these essential features of pedestrian crowd-quakes, a minimal model, i.e., a pedestrian crowd-quake model, was established. Effects including pedestrian gait, stress conservation level and personal intention to escape were explored.

Safer passenger car front shapes for pedestrians: A computational approach to reduce overall pedestrian injury risk in realistic impact scenarios.

PubMed

Li, Guibing; Yang, Jikuang; Simms, Ciaran

2017-03-01

Vehicle front shape has a significant influence on pedestrian injuries and the optimal design for overall pedestrian protection remains an elusive goal, especially considering the variability of vehicle-to-pedestrian accident scenarios. Therefore this study aims to develop and evaluate an efficient framework for vehicle front shape optimization for pedestrian protection accounting for the broad range of real world impact scenarios and their distributions in recent accident data. Firstly, a framework for vehicle front shape optimization for pedestrian protection was developed based on coupling of multi-body simulations and a genetic algorithm. This framework was then applied for optimizing passenger car front shape for pedestrian protection, and its predictions were evaluated using accident data and kinematic analyses. The results indicate that the optimization shows a good convergence and predictions of the optimization framework are corroborated when compared to the available accident data, and the optimization framework can distinguish 'good' and 'poor' vehicle front shapes for pedestrian safety. Thus, it is feasible and reliable to use the optimization framework for vehicle front shape optimization for reducing overall pedestrian injury risk. The results also show the importance of considering the broad range of impact scenarios in vehicle front shape optimization. A safe passenger car for overall pedestrian protection should have a wide and flat bumper (covering pedestrians' legs from the lower leg up to the shaft of the upper leg with generally even contacts), a bonnet leading edge height around 750mm, a short bonnet (<800mm) with a shallow or steep angle (either >17° or <12°) and a shallow windscreen (≤30°). Sensitivity studies based on simulations at the population level indicate that the demands for a safe passenger car front shape for head and leg protection are generally consistent, but partially conflict with pelvis protection. In particular, both

Analyzing fault in pedestrian-motor vehicle crashes in North Carolina.

PubMed

Ulfarsson, Gudmundur F; Kim, Sungyop; Booth, Kathleen M

2010-11-01

Crashes between pedestrians and motor vehicles are an important traffic safety concern. This paper explores the assignment of fault in such crashes, where observed factors are associated with pedestrian at fault, driver at fault, or both at fault. The analysis is based on police reported crash data for 1997 through 2000 in North Carolina, U.S.A. The results show that pedestrians are found at fault in 59% of the crashes, drivers in 32%, and both are found at fault in 9%. The results indicate drivers need to take greater notice of pedestrians when drivers are turning, merging, and backing up as these are some of the prime factors associated with the driver being found at fault in a crash. Pedestrians must apply greater caution when crossing streets, waiting to cross, and when walking along roads, as these are correlated with pedestrians being found at fault. The results suggest a need for campaigns focused on positively affecting pedestrian street-crossing behavior in combination with added jaywalking enforcement. The results also indicate that campaigns to increase the use of pedestrian visibility improvements at night can have a significant positive impact on traffic safety. Intoxication is a concern and the results show that it is not only driver intoxication that is affecting safety, but also pedestrian intoxication. The findings show in combination with other research in the field, that results from traffic safety studies are not necessarily transferable between distant geographic locations, and that location-specific safety research needs to take place. It is also important to further study the specific effects of the design of the pedestrian environment on safety, e.g. crosswalk spacing, signal timings, etc., which together may affect pedestrian safety and pedestrian behavior. 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

North Carolina pedestrian crossing guidance : final report.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2015-07-20

This research report is geared at providing guidance to NCDOT for when to consider marking crosswalks at : uncontrolled approaches for pedestrians, installing pedestrian signal heads at existing signalized intersections, or : providing supplemental t...

Automated pedestrian counter : final report, February 2010.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2010-02-01

Emerging sensor technologies accelerated the shift toward automatic pedestrian counting methods to : acquire reliable long-term data for transportation design, planning, and safety studies. Although a : number of commercial pedestrian sensors are ava...

Vehicular camera pedestrian detection research

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Liu, Jiahui

2018-03-01

With the rapid development of science and technology, it has made great development, but at the same time of highway traffic more convenient in highway traffic and transportation. However, in the meantime, traffic safety accidents occur more and more frequently in China. In order to deal with the increasingly heavy traffic safety. So, protecting the safety of people's personal property and facilitating travel has become a top priority. The real-time accurate pedestrian and driving environment are obtained through a vehicular camera which are used to detection and track the preceding moving targets. It is popular in the domain of intelligent vehicle safety driving, autonomous navigation and traffic system research. Based on the pedestrian video obtained by the Vehicular Camera, this paper studies the trajectory of pedestrian detection and its algorithm.

Impact of pedestrian malls on transportation activities.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1979-01-01

Pedestrian malls - streets that have been dedicated to pedestrian use only - are a popular urban renewal tactic for stimulating economic growth in deteriorating central business districts by attracting commercial retail business. Because of benefits ...

Necessity of guides in pedestrian emergency evacuation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yang, Xiaoxia; Dong, Hairong; Yao, Xiuming; Sun, Xubin; Wang, Qianling; Zhou, Min

2016-01-01

The role of guide who is in charge of leading pedestrians to evacuate in the case of emergency plays a critical role for the uninformed people. This paper first investigates the influence of mass behavior on evacuation dynamics and mainly focuses on the guided evacuation dynamics. In the extended crowd model proposed in this paper, individualistic behavior, herding behavior and environment influence are all considered for pedestrians who are not informed by the guide. According to the simulation results, herding behavior makes more pedestrians evacuate from the room in the same period of time. Besides, guided crowd demonstrates the same behavior of group dynamics which is characterized by gathering, conflicts and balance. Moreover, simulation results indicate guides with appropriate initial positions and quantity are more conducive to evacuation under a moderate initial density of pedestrians.

Multi-level hot zone identification for pedestrian safety.

PubMed

Lee, Jaeyoung; Abdel-Aty, Mohamed; Choi, Keechoo; Huang, Helai

2015-03-01

According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), while fatalities from traffic crashes have decreased, the proportion of pedestrian fatalities has steadily increased from 11% to 14% over the past decade. This study aims at identifying two zonal levels factors. The first is to identify hot zones at which pedestrian crashes occurs, while the second are zones where crash-involved pedestrians came from. Bayesian Poisson lognormal simultaneous equation spatial error model (BPLSESEM) was estimated and revealed significant factors for the two target variables. Then, PSIs (potential for safety improvements) were computed using the model. Subsequently, a novel hot zone identification method was suggested to combine both hot zones from where vulnerable pedestrians originated with hot zones where many pedestrian crashes occur. For the former zones, targeted safety education and awareness campaigns can be provided as countermeasures whereas area-wide engineering treatments and enforcement may be effective safety treatments for the latter ones. Thus, it is expected that practitioners are able to suggest appropriate safety treatments for pedestrian crashes using the method and results from this study. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Road User Behaviors At Pedestrian Hybrid Beacons

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2016-06-01

The pedestrian hybrid beacon (PHB) has shown great potential for improving pedestrian safety and driver yielding. However, questions remain regarding under what roadway conditions such as crossing distance (i.e., number of lanes) and posted speed ...

A study of pedestrian compliance with traffic signals for exclusive and concurrent phasing.

PubMed

Ivan, John N; McKernan, Kevin; Zhang, Yaohua; Ravishanker, Nalini; Mamun, Sha A

2017-01-01

This paper describes a comparison of pedestrian compliance at traffic signals with two types of pedestrian phasing: concurrent, where both pedestrians and vehicular traffic are directed to move in the same directions at the same time, and exclusive, where pedestrians are directed to move during their own dedicated phase while all vehicular traffic is stopped. Exclusive phasing is usually perceived to be safer, especially by senior and disabled advocacy groups, although these safety benefits depend upon pedestrians waiting for the walk signal. This paper investigates whether or not there are differences between pedestrian compliance at signals with exclusive pedestrian phasing and those with concurrent phasing and whether these differences continue to exist when compliance at exclusive phasing signals is evaluated as if they had concurrent phasing. Pedestrian behavior was observed at 42 signalized intersections in central Connecticut with both concurrent and exclusive pedestrian phasing. Binary regression models were estimated to predict pedestrian compliance as a function of the pedestrian phasing type and other intersection characteristics, such as vehicular and pedestrian volume, crossing distance and speed limit. We found that pedestrian compliance is significantly higher at intersections with concurrent pedestrian phasing than at those with exclusive pedestrian phasing, but this difference is not significant when compliance at exclusive phase intersections is evaluated as if it had concurrent phasing. This suggests that pedestrians treat exclusive phase intersections as though they have concurrent phasing, rendering the safety benefits of exclusive pedestrian phasing elusive. No differences were observed for senior or non-senior pedestrians. Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Calibrating cellular automaton models for pedestrians walking through corners

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Dias, Charitha; Lovreglio, Ruggiero

2018-05-01

Cellular Automata (CA) based pedestrian simulation models have gained remarkable popularity as they are simpler and easier to implement compared to other microscopic modeling approaches. However, incorporating traditional floor field representations in CA models to simulate pedestrian corner navigation behavior could result in unrealistic behaviors. Even though several previous studies have attempted to enhance CA models to realistically simulate pedestrian maneuvers around bends, such modifications have not been calibrated or validated against empirical data. In this study, two static floor field (SFF) representations, namely 'discrete representation' and 'continuous representation', are calibrated for CA-models to represent pedestrians' walking behavior around 90° bends. Trajectory data collected through a controlled experiment are used to calibrate these model representations. Calibration results indicate that although both floor field representations can represent pedestrians' corner navigation behavior, the 'continuous' representation fits the data better. Output of this study could be beneficial for enhancing the reliability of existing CA-based models by representing pedestrians' corner navigation behaviors more realistically.

Pedestrian Crossings. USMES Teacher Resource Book.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Brady, Ray, Jr., Ed.; Arbetter, Carolyn Clinton, Ed.

This USMES unit challenges students to recommend and try to have a change made which would improve the safety and convenience of a pedestrian crossing near the school. The teacher resource book for the Pedestrian Crossings unit contains five sections. The first section describes the USMES approach to student-initiated investigations of real…

Analyzing the impact of median treatments on pedestrian/bicyclist safety.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2017-05-01

To improve pedestrian/bicyclist safety, the Maryland Department of Transportation State Highway Administration (MDOT SHA) has identified several high-frequency pedestrian/bicyclist crash locations through the Pedestrian Roadway Safety Audit (PRSA) Pr...

Effect of speed matching on fundamental diagram of pedestrian flow

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Fu, Zhijian; Luo, Lin; Yang, Yue; Zhuang, Yifan; Zhang, Peitong; Yang, Lizhong; Yang, Hongtai; Ma, Jian; Zhu, Kongjin; Li, Yanlai

2016-09-01

Properties of pedestrian may change along their moving path, for example, as a result of fatigue or injury, which has never been properly investigated in the past research. The paper attempts to study the speed matching effect (a pedestrian adjusts his velocity constantly to the average velocity of his neighbors) and its influence on the density-velocity relationship (a pedestrian adjust his velocity to the surrounding density), known as the fundamental diagram of the pedestrian flow. By the means of the cellular automaton, the simulation results fit well with the empirical data, indicating the great advance of the discrete model for pedestrian dynamics. The results suggest that the system velocity and flow rate increase obviously under a big noise, i.e., a diverse composition of pedestrian crowd, especially in the region of middle or high density. Because of the temporary effect, the speed matching has little influence on the fundamental diagram. Along the entire density, the relationship between the step length and the average pedestrian velocity is a piecewise function combined two linear functions. The number of conflicts reaches the maximum with the pedestrian density of 2.5 m-2, while decreases by 5.1% with the speed matching.

Neighborhood Influences on Vehicle-Pedestrian Crash Severity.

PubMed

Toran Pour, Alireza; Moridpour, Sara; Tay, Richard; Rajabifard, Abbas

2017-12-01

Socioeconomic factors are known to be contributing factors for vehicle-pedestrian crashes. Although several studies have examined the socioeconomic factors related to the location of the crashes, limited studies have considered the socioeconomic factors of the neighborhood where the road users live in vehicle-pedestrian crash modelling. This research aims to identify the socioeconomic factors related to both the neighborhoods where the road users live and where crashes occur that have an influence on vehicle-pedestrian crash severity. Data on vehicle-pedestrian crashes that occurred at mid-blocks in Melbourne, Australia, was analyzed. Neighborhood factors associated with road users' residents and location of crash were investigated using boosted regression tree (BRT). Furthermore, partial dependence plots were applied to illustrate the interactions between these factors. We found that socioeconomic factors accounted for 60% of the 20 top contributing factors to vehicle-pedestrian crashes. This research reveals that socioeconomic factors of the neighborhoods where the road users live and where the crashes occur are important in determining the severity of the crashes, with the former having a greater influence. Hence, road safety countermeasures, especially those focussing on the road users, should be targeted at these high-risk neighborhoods.

Simulated interactions of pedestrian crossings and motorized vehicles in residential areas

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wang, Yan; Peng, Zhongyi; Chen, Qun

2018-01-01

To evaluate whether motorized vehicles can travel through a residential area, this paper develops a cellular automata (CA) model to simulate the interactions between pedestrian crossings and motorized vehicles in a residential area. In this paper, pedestrians determine their crossing speed according to their judgments of the position and velocity of the upcoming vehicles. The pedestrians may walk slowly or quickly or even run, and the pedestrian crossing time influences the vehicle movement. In addition, the proposed model considers the safety margin time needed for pedestrians to cross, and pedestrian-vehicle conflict is considered using the vehicle collision avoidance rule. Through simulations of interactions of pedestrian crossings with motorized vehicles' movement on a typical road in a residential area, the average wait time for pedestrians to cross and the average vehicle velocity under different pedestrian crossing volumes, different vehicle flows and different maximum vehicle velocities are obtained. To avoid an excessive waiting time for pedestrians to cross, the vehicle flow should be less than 180 veh/h, which allows an average of less than 10 s of waiting time; if the vehicle flow rate is less than 36 veh/h, then the waiting time is approximately 1 s. Field observations are conducted to validate the simulation results.

Safety effects of exclusive and concurrent signal phasing for pedestrian crossing.

PubMed

Zhang, Yaohua; Mamun, Sha A; Ivan, John N; Ravishanker, Nalini; Haque, Khademul

2015-10-01

This paper describes the estimation of pedestrian crash count and vehicle interaction severity prediction models for a sample of signalized intersections in Connecticut with either concurrent or exclusive pedestrian phasing. With concurrent phasing, pedestrians cross at the same time as motor vehicle traffic in the same direction receives a green phase, while with exclusive phasing, pedestrians cross during their own phase when all motor vehicle traffic on all approaches is stopped. Pedestrians crossing at each intersection were observed and classified according to the severity of interactions with motor vehicles. Observation intersections were selected to represent both types of signal phasing while controlling for other physical characteristics. In the nonlinear mixed models for interaction severity, pedestrians crossing on the walk signal at an exclusive signal experienced lower interaction severity compared to those crossing on the green light with concurrent phasing; however, pedestrians crossing on a green light where an exclusive phase was available experienced higher interaction severity. Intersections with concurrent phasing have fewer total pedestrian crashes than those with exclusive phasing but more crashes at higher severity levels. It is recommended that exclusive pedestrian phasing only be used at locations where pedestrians are more likely to comply. Copyright © 2015. Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Measuring pedestrian volumes and conflicts. Volume 2, Accident prediction model

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1987-12-01

This final report presents the findings, conclusions, and recommendations of the study conducted to model pedestrian/vehicle accidents. A group-type analysis approach for the prediction of pedestrian/vehicle accidents using pedestrian/vehicle conflic...

Modelling Pedestrian Travel Time and the Design of Facilities: A Queuing Approach

PubMed Central

Rahman, Khalidur; Abdul Ghani, Noraida; Abdulbasah Kamil, Anton; Mustafa, Adli; Kabir Chowdhury, Md. Ahmed

2013-01-01

Pedestrian movements are the consequence of several complex and stochastic facts. The modelling of pedestrian movements and the ability to predict the travel time are useful for evaluating the performance of a pedestrian facility. However, only a few studies can be found that incorporate the design of the facility, local pedestrian body dimensions, the delay experienced by the pedestrians, and level of service to the pedestrian movements. In this paper, a queuing based analytical model is developed as a function of relevant determinants and functional factors to predict the travel time on pedestrian facilities. The model can be used to assess the overall serving rate or performance of a facility layout and correlate it to the level of service that is possible to provide the pedestrians. It has also the ability to provide a clear suggestion on the designing and sizing of pedestrian facilities. The model is empirically validated and is found to be a robust tool to understand how well a particular walking facility makes possible comfort and convenient pedestrian movements. The sensitivity analysis is also performed to see the impact of some crucial parameters of the developed model on the performance of pedestrian facilities. PMID:23691055

Pedestrian injuries due to mobile phone use in public places.

PubMed

Nasar, Jack L; Troyer, Derek

2013-08-01

Research shows that pedestrians, similar to drivers, experience reduced situation awareness, distracted attention and unsafe behavior when talking or texting on their mobile phones. The present study centered on injuries related to mobile phone use among pedestrians. It used data from the US Consumer Product Safety Commission on injuries in hospital emergency rooms from 2004 through 2010. It found that mobile-phone related injuries among pedestrians increased relative to total pedestrian injuries, and paralleled the increase in injuries for drivers, and in 2010 exceeded those for drivers. Pedestrian injuries related to mobile-phone use were higher for males and for people under 31 years old. Using a mobile phone while walking puts pedestrians at risk of accident, injury or death. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Night-time pedestrian conspicuity: effects of clothing on drivers' eye movements.

PubMed

Wood, Joanne M; Tyrrell, Richard A; Lacherez, Philippe; Black, Alex A

2017-03-01

Drivers' responses and eye movements were assessed as they approached pedestrians at night in order to explore the relative conspicuity benefits of different configurations of retroreflective markings. Eye movements were recorded using an ASL Mobile Eye (Applied Science Technologies, www.asleyetracking.com) from 14 young licensed drivers (M = 24.1 ± 6.4 years) as they drove along a closed-road circuit at night. At two locations, pedestrians walked in place facing either towards or away from the road. Pedestrians wore black clothing with a standard retroreflective vest either alone or with additional retroreflective markers positioned in a configuration conveying biological motion (biomotion). Drivers responded when they recognised that a pedestrian was present and again when they identified the direction the pedestrian was facing. Drivers recognised pedestrians from a significantly greater distance (p < 0.05) when the pedestrian's clothing included the biomotion configuration (319.1 m) than when the biomotion markings were absent (184.5 m). Further, the drivers recognised the direction that the pedestrian faced from a longer distance when biomotion markings were present (215.4 m vs 95.6 m). Eye movement data suggested that the biomotion configuration attracted drivers' attention significantly sooner than the vest (time to first fixation: 1.1 vs 3.5 s), that drivers fixated on pedestrians wearing biomotion for significantly less time prior to responding (3.4 s vs 6.1 s), and the time to first recognise a pedestrian was approximately half that for biomotion compared to vest (6.4 vs 13.9 s). Adding biomotion reflectors to the vest facilitated earlier recognition of pedestrians and faster identification of the direction that the pedestrian faced. These findings confirm that the conspicuity advantages of biomotion configurations on pedestrians at night result in part from drivers fixating pedestrians earlier and more efficiently. © 2017 The Authors

A comparison of alcohol involvement in pedestrians and pedestrian casualties

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1979-10-01

The objectives of this study were to determine the frequency of alcohol involvement in adult (14 years +) pedestrian fatalities and injuries; determine if alcohol was overrepresented; determine the causal role of alcohol; and suggest countermeasures....

Understanding interactions between drivers and pedestrian features at signalized intersections.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2015-10-01

Florida experienced serious pedestrian safety problems and had the highest pedestrian fatality rate in the U.S. from : 20082011. Pedestrian safety at signalized intersections is the most serious concern due to frequent and severe : conflicts betwe...

Establishing procedures and guidelines for pedestrian treatments at uncontrolled locations

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2017-08-01

Pedestrians are the most vulnerable road users. The risks to pedestrians crossing at uncontrolled locations are much higher than at signalized intersections. There has been an increasing trend in pedestrian deaths during the past decade. Specifically...

Modeling pedestrian gap crossing index under mixed traffic condition.

PubMed

Naser, Mohamed M; Zulkiple, Adnan; Al Bargi, Walid A; Khalifa, Nasradeen A; Daniel, Basil David

2017-12-01

There are a variety of challenges faced by pedestrians when they walk along and attempt to cross a road, as the most recorded accidents occur during this time. Pedestrians of all types, including both sexes with numerous aging groups, are always subjected to risk and are characterized as the most exposed road users. The increased demand for better traffic management strategies to reduce the risks at intersections, improve quality traffic management, traffic volume, and longer cycle time has further increased concerns over the past decade. This paper aims to develop a sustainable pedestrian gap crossing index model based on traffic flow density. It focusses on the gaps accepted by pedestrians and their decision for street crossing, where (Log-Gap) logarithm of accepted gaps was used to optimize the result of a model for gap crossing behavior. Through a review of extant literature, 15 influential variables were extracted for further empirical analysis. Subsequently, data from the observation at an uncontrolled mid-block in Jalan Ampang in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia was gathered and Multiple Linear Regression (MLR) and Binary Logit Model (BLM) techniques were employed to analyze the results. From the results, different pedestrian behavioral characteristics were considered for a minimum gap size model, out of which only a few (four) variables could explain the pedestrian road crossing behavior while the remaining variables have an insignificant effect. Among the different variables, age, rolling gap, vehicle type, and crossing were the most influential variables. The study concludes that pedestrians' decision to cross the street depends on the pedestrian age, rolling gap, vehicle type, and size of traffic gap before crossing. The inferences from these models will be useful to increase pedestrian safety and performance evaluation of uncontrolled midblock road crossings in developing countries. Copyright © 2017 National Safety Council and Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Robust Pedestrian Classification Based on Hierarchical Kernel Sparse Representation

PubMed Central

Sun, Rui; Zhang, Guanghai; Yan, Xiaoxing; Gao, Jun

2016-01-01

Vision-based pedestrian detection has become an active topic in computer vision and autonomous vehicles. It aims at detecting pedestrians appearing ahead of the vehicle using a camera so that autonomous vehicles can assess the danger and take action. Due to varied illumination and appearance, complex background and occlusion pedestrian detection in outdoor environments is a difficult problem. In this paper, we propose a novel hierarchical feature extraction and weighted kernel sparse representation model for pedestrian classification. Initially, hierarchical feature extraction based on a CENTRIST descriptor is used to capture discriminative structures. A max pooling operation is used to enhance the invariance of varying appearance. Then, a kernel sparse representation model is proposed to fully exploit the discrimination information embedded in the hierarchical local features, and a Gaussian weight function as the measure to effectively handle the occlusion in pedestrian images. Extensive experiments are conducted on benchmark databases, including INRIA, Daimler, an artificially generated dataset and a real occluded dataset, demonstrating the more robust performance of the proposed method compared to state-of-the-art pedestrian classification methods. PMID:27537888

Robust Pedestrian Classification Based on Hierarchical Kernel Sparse Representation.

PubMed

Sun, Rui; Zhang, Guanghai; Yan, Xiaoxing; Gao, Jun

2016-08-16

Vision-based pedestrian detection has become an active topic in computer vision and autonomous vehicles. It aims at detecting pedestrians appearing ahead of the vehicle using a camera so that autonomous vehicles can assess the danger and take action. Due to varied illumination and appearance, complex background and occlusion pedestrian detection in outdoor environments is a difficult problem. In this paper, we propose a novel hierarchical feature extraction and weighted kernel sparse representation model for pedestrian classification. Initially, hierarchical feature extraction based on a CENTRIST descriptor is used to capture discriminative structures. A max pooling operation is used to enhance the invariance of varying appearance. Then, a kernel sparse representation model is proposed to fully exploit the discrimination information embedded in the hierarchical local features, and a Gaussian weight function as the measure to effectively handle the occlusion in pedestrian images. Extensive experiments are conducted on benchmark databases, including INRIA, Daimler, an artificially generated dataset and a real occluded dataset, demonstrating the more robust performance of the proposed method compared to state-of-the-art pedestrian classification methods.

Cars kill chimpanzees: case report of a wild chimpanzee killed on a road at Bulindi, Uganda.

PubMed

McLennan, Matthew R; Asiimwe, Caroline

2016-07-01

Roads have broadly adverse impacts on wildlife, including nonhuman primates. One direct effect is mortality from collisions with vehicles. While highly undesirable, roadkills provide valuable information on the health and condition of endangered species. We present a case report of a wild chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes schweinfurthii) killed crossing a road in Bulindi, Uganda, where chimpanzees inhabit forest fragments amid farmland. Details of the collision are constructed from eyewitness accounts of pedestrians. Physical examination of the cadaver indicated good overall body condition; at 40 kg, the deceased female was heavier than usual for an adult female East African chimpanzee. No external wounds or fractures were noted. Coprological assessment demonstrated infection by several gastrointestinal parasites commonly reported in living wild chimpanzees. Histopathology revealed eosinophilic enteritis and biliary hyperplasia potentially caused by parasite infection. However, eosinophilia was not widely spread into the submucosa, while egg/cyst counts suggested low-intensity parasite infections compared to healthy female chimpanzees of similar age in nearby Budongo Forest. No behavioral indicators of ill health were noted in the deceased female in the month prior to the accident. We conclude that cause of death was acute, i.e., shock from the collision, and was probably unrelated to parasite infection or any other underlying health condition. Notably, this female had asymmetrical polythelia, and, while nursing at the time of her death, had one functioning mammary gland only. In Uganda, where primates often inhabit human-dominated landscapes, human population growth and economic development has given rise to increasing motor traffic, while road development is enabling motorists to travel at greater speeds. Thus, the danger of roads to apes and other wildlife is rising, necessitating urgent strategies to reduce risks. Installation of simple speed-bumps-common on Ugandan

Examining the Characteristics of Fatal Pedestrian Crashes

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2016-11-01

Pedestrian safety has become a strategic priority for UDOT over the past two years. In Utah, pedestrians make up over 12% of total roadway fatalities while less than 2% of all trips are taken on foot. This over-representation of risk led to the creat...

Analyzing fault and severity in pedestrian-motor vehicle accidents in China.

PubMed

Zhang, Guangnan; Yau, Kelvin K W; Zhang, Xun

2014-12-01

The number of pedestrian-motor vehicle accidents and pedestrian deaths in China surged in recent years. However, a large scale empirical research on pedestrian traffic crashes in China is lacking. In this study, we identify significant risk factors associated with fault and severity in pedestrian-motor vehicle accidents. Risk factors in several different dimensions, including pedestrian, driver, vehicle, road and environmental factors, are considered. We analyze 6967 pedestrian traffic accident reports for the period 2006-2010 in Guangdong Province, China. These data, obtained from the Guangdong Provincial Security Department, are extracted from the Traffic Management Sector-Specific Incident Case Data Report. Pedestrian traffic crashes have a unique inevitability and particular high risk, due to pedestrians' fragility, slow movement and lack of lighting equipment. The empirical analysis of the present study has the following policy implications. First, traffic crashes in which pedestrians are at fault are more likely to cause serious injuries or death, suggesting that relevant agencies should pay attention to measures that prevent pedestrians from violating traffic rules. Second, both the attention to elderly pedestrians, male and experienced drivers, the penalty to drunk driving, speeding, driving without a driver's license and other violation behaviors should be strengthened. Third, vehicle safety inspections and safety training sessions for truck drivers should be reinforced. Fourth, improving the road conditions and road lighting at night are important measures in reducing the probability of accident casualties. Fifth, specific road safety campaigns in rural areas, and education programs especially for young children and teens should be developed and promoted. Moreover, we reveal a country-specific factor, hukou, which has significant effect on the severity in pedestrian accidents due to the discrepancy in the level of social insurance/security, suggesting

A Finite Element Model of a Midsize Male for Simulating Pedestrian Accidents.

PubMed

Untaroiu, Costin D; Pak, Wansoo; Meng, Yunzhu; Schap, Jeremy; Koya, Bharath; Gayzik, Scott

2018-01-01

Pedestrians represent one of the most vulnerable road users and comprise nearly 22% the road crash-related fatalities in the world. Therefore, protection of pedestrians in car-to-pedestrian collisions (CPC) has recently generated increased attention with regulations involving three subsystem tests. The development of a finite element (FE) pedestrian model could provide a complementary component that characterizes the whole-body response of vehicle-pedestrian interactions and assesses the pedestrian injuries. The main goal of this study was to develop and to validate a simplified full body FE model corresponding to a 50th male pedestrian in standing posture (M50-PS). The FE model mesh and defined material properties are based on a 50th percentile male occupant model. The lower limb-pelvis and lumbar spine regions of the human model were validated against the postmortem human surrogate (PMHS) test data recorded in four-point lateral knee bending tests, pelvic\\abdomen\\shoulder\\thoracic impact tests, and lumbar spine bending tests. Then, a pedestrian-to-vehicle impact simulation was performed using the whole pedestrian model, and the results were compared to corresponding PMHS tests. Overall, the simulation results showed that lower leg response is mostly within the boundaries of PMHS corridors. In addition, the model shows the capability to predict the most common lower extremity injuries observed in pedestrian accidents. Generally, the validated pedestrian model may be used by safety researchers in the design of front ends of new vehicles in order to increase pedestrian protection.

Fatigue effect on phase transition of pedestrian movement: experiment and simulation study

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Luo, Lin; Fu, Zhijian; Zhou, Xiaodong; Zhu, Kongjin; Yang, Hongtai; Yang, Lizhong

2016-10-01

How to model pedestrian movement is an intriguing problem in the area of statistical physics. As a common phenomenon of pedestrian movement, fatigue has a significant negative effect on pedestrian movement, especially when pedestrians move or run with heavy luggage, rescue the wounded in disaster, climb stairs and etc. According to the field observations and previous researches, fatigue coefficient is defined as the decrease of desired velocity in this study. However, previous researches lacked quantitative analysis of the effect of fatigue on pedestrian speed. It has been a great challenge to study the effect of fatigue on pedestrian flow, since pedestrians of heterogeneous walking abilities and the change of pedestrians’ moving properties need to be taken into consideration. Thus, at first, a series of pedestrian experiments, under three different conditions, were conducted to formulate the empirical relationship among fatigue, average free velocity, and walking distance. Then the empirical formulation of pedestrian fatigue was imported into the multi-velocity field floor cellular automata (FFCA) model for following pedestrian dynamics analysis. The velocity ratio was adjusted dynamically to adapt the change of pedestrians’ velocity due to fatigue. The fatigue, entrance flow rate and pedestrian’s initial desired velocity are found to have significant effects on the pedestrian flow. The space-time distributions of pedestrian density and velocity were explored in detail, with phase transition analyses from a free flow phase to a congestion phase. Additionally, the ‘density wave’ in the system can be observed if a certain ratio of burdened pedestrians lay in the high density region. The envelope of the ‘density wave’ reaches its maximum amplitude around the entrance position, and gradually diminishes away from the entrance.

Modeling pedestrian evacuation by means of game theory

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Shi, Dongmei; Zhang, Wenyao; Wang, Binghong

2017-04-01

Pedestrian evacuation is studied based on a modified lattice model. The payoff matrix in this model represents the complicated interactions between selfish individuals, and the mean force imposed on an individual is given by considering the impacts of neighbors, walls, and defector herding. Each passer-by moves to his selected location according to the Fermi function, and the average velocity of pedestrian flow is defined as a function of the motion rule. Two pedestrian types are included: cooperators, who adhere to the evacuation instructions; and defectors, who ignore the rules and act individually. It is observed that the escape time increases as fear degree increases, and the system remains smooth for a low fear degree, but exhibits three stages for a high fear degree. We prove that the fear degree determines the dynamics of this system, and the initial density of cooperators has a negligible impact. The system experiences three phases, a single phase of cooperator, a mixed two-phase pedestrian, and a single phase of defector sequentially as the fear degree upgrades. The phase transition has been proven basically robust to the changes of empty site contribution, wall’s pressure, and noise amplitude in the motion rule. It is further shown that pedestrians derive the greatest benefit from overall cooperation, but are trapped in the worst situation if they are all defectors. Dynamics of pedestrian evacuation.

Update schemes of multi-velocity floor field cellular automaton for pedestrian dynamics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Luo, Lin; Fu, Zhijian; Cheng, Han; Yang, Lizhong

2018-02-01

Modeling pedestrian movement is an interesting problem both in statistical physics and in computational physics. Update schemes of cellular automaton (CA) models for pedestrian dynamics govern the schedule of pedestrian movement. Usually, different update schemes make the models behave in different ways, which should be carefully recalibrated. Thus, in this paper, we investigated the influence of four different update schemes, namely parallel/synchronous scheme, random scheme, order-sequential scheme and shuffled scheme, on pedestrian dynamics. The multi-velocity floor field cellular automaton (FFCA) considering the changes of pedestrians' moving properties along walking paths and heterogeneity of pedestrians' walking abilities was used. As for parallel scheme only, the collisions detection and resolution should be considered, resulting in a great difference from any other update schemes. For pedestrian evacuation, the evacuation time is enlarged, and the difference in pedestrians' walking abilities is better reflected, under parallel scheme. In face of a bottleneck, for example a exit, using a parallel scheme leads to a longer congestion period and a more dispersive density distribution. The exit flow and the space-time distribution of density and velocity have significant discrepancies under four different update schemes when we simulate pedestrian flow with high desired velocity. Update schemes may have no influence on pedestrians in simulation to create tendency to follow others, but sequential and shuffled update scheme may enhance the effect of pedestrians' familiarity with environments.

Introduction of frictional and turning function for pedestrian outflow with an obstacle.

PubMed

Yanagisawa, Daichi; Kimura, Ayako; Tomoeda, Akiyasu; Nishi, Ryosuke; Suma, Yushi; Ohtsuka, Kazumichi; Nishinari, Katsuhiro

2009-09-01

In this paper, two important factors which affect the pedestrian outflow at a bottleneck significantly are studied in detail to analyze the effect of an obstacle setup in front of an exit. One is a conflict at an exit when pedestrians evacuate from a room. We use floor field model for simulating such behavior, which is a well-studied pedestrian model using cellular automata. The conflicts have been taken into account by the friction parameter. However, the friction parameter so far is a constant and does not depend on the number of the pedestrians conflicting at the same time. Thus, we have improved the friction parameter by the frictional function, which is a function of the number of the pedestrians involved in the conflict. Second, we have presented the cost of turning of pedestrians at the exit. Since pedestrians have inertia, their walking speeds decrease when they turn and the pedestrian outflow decreases. The validity of the extended model, which includes the frictional function and the turning function, is supported by the comparison of a mean-field theory and real experiments. We have observed that the pedestrian flow increases when we put an obstacle in front of an exit in our real experiments. The analytical results clearly explains the mechanism of the effect of the obstacle, i.e., the obstacle blocks pedestrians moving to the exit and decreases the average number of pedestrians involved in the conflict. We have also found that an obstacle works more effectively when we shift it from the center since pedestrians go through the exit with less turning.

Modeling pedestrian violation behavior at signalized crosswalks in China: a hazards-based duration approach.

PubMed

Guo, Hongwei; Gao, Ziyou; Yang, Xiaobao; Jiang, Xiaobei

2011-02-01

Pedestrian violation is a major cause of traffic accidents involving pedestrians. The research objectives were to investigate the relationship between waiting duration and pedestrian violation and to provide a qualitative and quantitative analysis of the effects of human factors and external environmental factors on street-crossing behavior. Pedestrians' street-crossing behavior was examined by modeling the waiting duration at signalized crosswalk. Pedestrian waiting duration was collected by video cameras and it was assigned as censored and uncensored data to distinguish between normal crossing and violating crossing. A nonparametric baseline duration model was introduced, and variables revealing personal characteristics, traffic conditions, and trip features were defined as covariates to describe the effects of internal and external factors. Pedestrians' crossing behaviors represented positive duration dependence that the longer the waiting time elapsed the more likely pedestrians would end the wait soon. The violation inclination of most pedestrians increased with the increasing waiting duration, but about 10 percent of pedestrians were at high risk of violation to cross the street. About half of pedestrians would still obey the traffic rules even after waiting for 50 s by the street. Human factors and the external environment played an important role in street-crossing behavior, especially for factors that involved pedestrians' subjective willingness. The street-crossing behavior of pedestrians was time dependent. Pedestrians behave differently under the effects of various factors. Pedestrian safety interventions that aim at reducing pedestrian injuries may need to consider these effects. The pedestrians' behavioral modifications, such as enhancing the safety awareness, might be the most efficient means to reducing the likelihood of pedestrian violation, though environmental modifications also worked well in improving pedestrian safety.

Community-based pedestrian safety training in virtual reality: A pragmatic trial.

PubMed

Schwebel, David C; Combs, Tabitha; Rodriguez, Daniel; Severson, Joan; Sisiopiku, Virginia

2016-01-01

Child pedestrian injuries are a leading cause of mortality and morbidity across the United States and the world. Repeated practice at the cognitive-perceptual task of crossing a street may lead to safer pedestrian behavior. Virtual reality offers a unique opportunity for repeated practice without the risk of actual injury. This study conducted a pre-post within-subjects trial of training children in pedestrian safety using a semi-mobile, semi-immersive virtual pedestrian environment placed at schools and community centers. Pedestrian safety skills among a group of 44 seven- and eight-year-old children were assessed in a laboratory, and then children completed six 15-minute training sessions in the virtual pedestrian environment at their school or community center following pragmatic trial strategies over the course of three weeks. Following training, pedestrian safety skills were re-assessed. Results indicate improvement in delay entering traffic following training. Safe crossings did not demonstrate change. Attention to traffic and time to contact with oncoming vehicles both decreased somewhat, perhaps an indication that training was incomplete and children were in the process of actively learning to be safer pedestrians. The findings suggest virtual reality environments placed in community centers hold promise for teaching children to be safer pedestrians, but future research is needed to determine the optimal training dosage. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Pedestrian and bicycle crash data analysis : 2005-2010.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2012-04-03

The safety of pedestrians and bicyclists using the roadway is an increasing concern for the Michigan Department of Transportation (MDOT). This report summarizes data for motor vehicle crashes involving pedestrians and bicyclists in Michigan from 2005...

Pedestrian friendly traffic signal control : final research report.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2016-01-01

This project continues research aimed at real-time detection and use of pedestrian : traffic flow information to enhance adaptive traffic signal control in urban areas : where pedestrian traffic is substantial and must be given appropriate attention ...

A comparison of alcohol involvement in pedestrians and pedestrian casualties

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1979-10-01

A field accident research study was conducted in the City of New Orleans in : 1975-76 in order to (1) determine the percentage and relative risk of alcohol involvement : in adult pedestrian fatal and injury accidents; (2) identify in the alcohol invo...

Social evaluation of intentional, truly accidental, and negligently accidental helpers and harmers by 10-month-old infants.

PubMed

Woo, Brandon M; Steckler, Conor M; Le, Doan T; Hamlin, J Kiley

2017-11-01

Whereas adults largely base their evaluations of others' actions on others' intentions, a host of research in developmental psychology suggests that younger children privilege outcome over intention, leading them to condemn accidental harm. To date, this question has been examined only with children capable of language production. In the current studies, we utilized a non-linguistic puppet show paradigm to examine the evaluation of intentional and accidental acts of helping or harming in 10-month-old infants. In Experiment 1 (n=64), infants preferred intentional over accidental helpers but accidental over intentional harmers, suggestive that by this age infants incorporate information about others' intentions into their social evaluations. In Experiment 2 (n=64), infants did not distinguish "negligently" accidental from intentional helpers or harmers, suggestive that infants may find negligent accidents somewhat intentional. In Experiment 3 (n=64), we found that infants preferred truly accidental over negligently accidental harmers, but did not reliably distinguish negligently accidental from truly accidental helpers, consistent with past work with adults and children suggestive that humans are particularly sensitive to negligently accidental harm. Together, these results imply that infants engage in intention-based social evaluation of those who help and harm accidentally, so long as those accidents do not stem from negligence. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

The relationship between the availability of the supporting elements of pedestrian with pedestrian crossing facility usage based on user preferences (Case Study corridor of Sumbersari Street, Gajayana Street, MT. Haryono Street, Malang City)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Soetrisno, D. P.

2017-06-01

Pedestrian crossing facilities are effective enough to avoid pedestrians with vehicles, but its utilization is still quite low. It indicated that safety is not the only factor that influences a person to utilize the pedestrian crossing facilities. In addition, the availability of supporting elements of the pedestrian is still not quite attention, which is also became a factor that causes the pedestrians doesn’t utilize the pedestrian crossing facilities. Therefore, this research was structured to examine the relationship between the availability of the supporting elements of the pedestrian with pedestrian crossing facility usage based on user preferences. Data collection method used is primary survey consist of observation and the questionnaire. Sampling techniques used is purposive sampling with the number of respondents as many as 211 respondents by using questionnaire with ordinal scales to identify respondents’ consideration level of supporting elements pedestrian and crossing facility utilization factors. The survey is done on 15 crossing facilities area in 3 different locations with the same characteristics of land use in the form of higher education area (university area) and trades and services activities area. The analysis technique used is frequency distribution analysis in order to identify preference pedestrian on the availability of supporting elements of pedestrian and pedestrian crossing facility utilization factors, and chi square analysis is used to analyze the relationship between the availability of the supporting elements of the pedestrian with pedestrian crossing facility utilization. Based on the chi square analysis results with significance 5 % obtained the result that there are six supporting elements of pedestrian having correlation to the factors of pedestrian crossing facility utilization consist of the availability of sidewalk, pedestrian lights, Street Lighting Lamps, Pedestrian Crossing Markings Facilities, Sign Crossings

Impact of access management practices to pedestrian safety.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2017-03-31

This study focused on the impact of access management practices to the safety of pedestrians. Some : of the access management practices considered to impact pedestrian safety included limiting direct : access to and from major streets, locating signa...

Spatial Analysis in Determining Physical Factors of Pedestrian Space Livability, Case Study: Pedestrian Space on Jalan Kemasan, Yogyakarta

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Fauzi, A. F.; Aditianata, A.

2018-02-01

The existence of street as a place to perform various human activities becomes an important issue nowadays. In the last few decades, cars and motorcycles dominate streets in various cities in the world. On the other hand, human activity on the street is the determinant of the city livability. Previous research has pointed out that if there is lots of human activity in the street, then the city will be interesting. Otherwise, if the street has no activity, then the city will be boring. Learning from that statement, now various cities in the world are developing the concept of livable streets. Livable streets shown by diversity of human activities conducted in the streets’ pedestrian space. In Yogyakarta, one of the streets shown diversity of human activities is Jalan Kemasan. This study attempts to determine the physical factors of pedestrian space affecting the livability in Jalan Kemasan Yogyakarta through spatial analysis. Spatial analysis was performed by overlay technique between liveable point (activity diversity) distribution map and variable distribution map. Those physical pedestrian space research variable included element of shading, street vendors, building setback, seat location, divider between street and pedestrian way, and mixed use building function. More diverse the activity of one variable, then those variable are more affected then others. Overlay result then strengthened by field observation to qualitatively ensure the deduction. In the end, this research will provide valuable input for street and pedestrian space planning that is comfortable for human activities.

Relations between temperamental fear and risky pedestrian behavior.

PubMed

Shen, Jiabin; McClure, Leslie A; Schwebel, David C

2015-07-01

Child pedestrian injury poses a significant global public health challenge. This study examines relations between temperamental fear and children's risky pedestrian behavior, utilizing mediation analytic strategies to study underlying mechanisms of the hypothesized relation. As part of a larger study, 240 seven- and eight-year-old children completed 30 crossings in a virtual reality (VR) pedestrian environment. Three pedestrian behaviors were considered: start gap (lag after a traffic gap appears before child initiates crossing into the gap), time to contact (TTC; gap between avatar and the lead oncoming vehicle), and hits (collisions with vehicles in simulated crossings). Temperamental fear was measured by parent report. Fearful children were more likely to be struck by virtual vehicles, and the relation between fear and risky pedestrian behaviors was mediated by start gap and TTC. Specifically, children who were temperamentally more fearful were more likely to hesitate before initiating crossing, which led to shorter gaps between themselves and the oncoming vehicle, hence causing them to be more likely to be hit by virtual vehicles. Gender interacted with fear, such that fearful girls were most likely to be hit. Both temperamental fear and gender influenced the risk of child pedestrian injuries. Delayed entry into traffic and shorter gaps between children and oncoming vehicles may underlie this relation. Future research should explore how these factors might influence the effectiveness of prevention programs. Copyright © 2015. Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Development and test of rural pedestrian safety countermeasures

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1983-12-01

Prior to any promulgation by NHTSA of four model traffic regulations for rural pedestrian safety it was the objective of this study to assess, where feasible, the potential effectiveness of these regulations to prevent pedestrian accidents. The model...

Comprehensive study to reduce pedestrian crashes in Florida.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2013-12-01

Pedestrian crashes are a major traffic safety concern in Florida. This project aims to improve pedestrian safety on : Floridas state roads by identifying crash patterns and contributing factors at both the statewide and site-specific : level and p...

Evaluating Countermeasures to Improve Pedestrian and Bicycle Safety

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2018-11-01

Pedestrian crashes have reached an alarming level in the U.S. Different factors could contribute to the occurrence of these crashes at an intersection, including driver errors, the type of maneuver, and pedestrian behaviors. All these factors highlig...

Oriented regions grouping based candidate proposal for infrared pedestrian detection

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wang, Jiangtao; Zhang, Jingai; Li, Huaijiang

2018-04-01

Effectively and accurately locating the positions of pedestrian candidates in image is a key task for the infrared pedestrian detection system. In this work, a novel similarity measuring metric is designed. Based on the selective search scheme, the developed similarity measuring metric is utilized to yield the possible locations for pedestrian candidate. Besides this, corresponding diversification strategies are also provided according to the characteristics of the infrared thermal imaging system. Experimental results indicate that the presented scheme can achieve more efficient outputs than the traditional selective search methodology for the infrared pedestrian detection task.

Quantitative analysis of pedestrian safety at uncontrolled multi-lane mid-block crosswalks in China.

PubMed

Zhang, Cunbao; Zhou, Bin; Chen, Guojun; Chen, Feng

2017-11-01

A lot of pedestrian-vehicle crashes at mid-block crosswalks severely threaten pedestrian's safety around the world. The situations are even worse in China due to low yielding rate of vehicles at crosswalks. In order to quantitatively analyze pedestrian's safety at multi-lane mid-block crosswalks, the number of pedestrian-vehicle conflicts was utilized to evaluate pedestrian's accident risk. Five mid-block crosswalks (Wuhan, China) were videoed to collect data of traffic situation and pedestrian-vehicle conflicts, and the quantity and spatial distribution of pedestrian-vehicle conflicts at multi-lane mid-block crosswalk were analyzed according to lane-based post-encroachment time(LPET). Statistical results indicate that conflicts are mainly concentrated in lane3 and lane6. Percentage of conflict of each lane numbered from 1 to 6 respectively are 4.1%, 13.1%, 19.8%, 8.4%, 19.0%, 28.1%. Conflict rate under different crossing strategies are also counted. Moreover, an order probit (OP) model of pedestrian-vehicle conflict analysis (PVCA) was built to find out the contributions corresponding to those factors (such as traffic volume, vehicle speed, pedestrian crossing behavior, pedestrian refuge, etc.) to pedestrian-vehicle conflicts. The results show that: pedestrian refuge have positive effects on pedestrian safety; on the other hand, high vehicle speed, high traffic volume, rolling gap crossing pattern, and larger pedestrian platoon have negative effects on pedestrian safety. Based on our field observation and PVCA model, the number of conflicts will rise by 2% while the traffic volume increases 200 pcu/h; similarly, if the vehicle speed increases 5km/h, the number of conflicts will rise by 12% accordingly. The research results could be used to evaluate pedestrian safety at multi-lane mid-block crosswalks, and useful to improve pedestrian safety by means of pedestrian safety education, pedestrian refuge setting, vehicle speed limiting, and so on. Copyright © 2017

Coarse-to-fine deep neural network for fast pedestrian detection

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Li, Yaobin; Yang, Xinmei; Cao, Lijun

2017-11-01

Pedestrian detection belongs to a category of object detection is a key issue in the field of video surveillance and automatic driving. Although recent object detection methods, such as Fast/Faster RCNN, have achieved excellent performance, it is difficult to meet real-time requirements and limits the application in real scenarios. A coarse-to-fine deep neural network for fast pedestrian detection is proposed in this paper. Two-stage approach is presented to realize fine trade-off between accuracy and speed. In the coarse stage, we train a fast deep convolution neural network to generate most pedestrian candidates at the cost of a number of false positives. The detector can cover the majority of scales, sizes, and occlusions of pedestrians. After that, a classification network is introduced to refine the pedestrian candidates generated from the previous stage. Refining through classification network, most of false detections will be excluded easily and the final pedestrian predictions with bounding box and confidence score are produced. Competitive results have been achieved on INRIA dataset in terms of accuracy, especially the method can achieve real-time detection that is faster than the previous leading methods. The effectiveness of coarse-to-fine approach to detect pedestrians is verified, and the accuracy and stability are also improved.

[Pedestrian accidents].

PubMed

Bugmann, I; Röthlisberger, M; Friederich, N F; Müller, W

1998-12-03

The epidemiology of non-traffic-related, pedestrian injuries in the winter sports resort of Arosa (Switzerland) between 1968 and 1995 (beginning december to end april) was studied. A total of 2813 patients (1140 male and 1673 female patients) with 3010 injuries was surveyed in a general practice. The study showed in the examined period not only an increasing number of injuries and a culmination in February, but also a higher risk for females (60 versus 40 per cent) and an increasing incidence with age. 6% of all patients had more than one injury and 5% required hospitalization. Most pedestrians had injuries of the upper and lower extremity; fracture of the distal radius was the most often diagnosed injury, followed by distortions of the foot and wrist and fractures of the ankle. For accident prevention it is important, that the authorities do not abstain from mechanical cleaning of walking surfaces as soon as they become slippery and from giving out warnings via the mass media. For outdoor walking we postulate boots for ankle protection. The results are discussed and compared with already existing publications.

Analysis on influencing factors and decision-making of pedestrian crossing at intersections

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Liu, Likun; Wang, Ziyang

2017-10-01

The city signal intersection always has complex traffic flow and many traffic accidents. As vulnerable participants, the proportion of traffic accidents involving pedestrians remain high. And a lot of insecure crossing behavior seriously reduce the safety of the intersection. Therefore, it is necessary to carry out in-depth study on the traversing characteristics of pedestrians, reveal the inherent laws of pedestrian crossing, and then put forward targeted measures to improve pedestrian traffic environment, protect pedestrian crossing safety and improve traffic efficiency.

Influencing Factors on Conflicts of Turning Vehicles and Pedestrians at Intersections

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2015-09-30

Vehicle drivers are expected to yield to pedestrians when there are conflicts, however drivers may fail to see pedestrians and react to pedestrians when they are influenced by various factors such as the surrounding traffic, intersection geometric, v...

Development of a portable bicycle/pedestrian monitoring system for safety enhancement

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Usher, Colin; Daley, W. D. R.

2015-03-01

Pedestrians involved in roadway accidents account for nearly 12 percent of all traffic fatalities and 59,000 injuries each year. Most injuries occur when pedestrians attempt to cross roads, and there have been noted differences in accident rates midblock vs. at intersections. Collecting data on pedestrian behavior is a time consuming manual process that is prone to error. This leads to a lack of quality information to guide the proper design of lane markings and traffic signals to enhance pedestrian safety. Researchers at the Georgia Tech Research Institute are developing and testing an automated system that can be rapidly deployed for data collection to support the analysis of pedestrian behavior at intersections and midblock crossings with and without traffic signals. This system will analyze the collected video data to automatically identify and characterize the number of pedestrians and their behavior. It consists of a mobile trailer with four high definition pan-tilt cameras for data collection. The software is custom designed and uses state of the art commercial pedestrian detection algorithms. We will be presenting the system hardware and software design, challenges, and results from the preliminary system testing. Preliminary results indicate the ability to provide representative quantitative data on pedestrian motion data more efficiently than current techniques.

Training strategy for convolutional neural networks in pedestrian gender classification

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ng, Choon-Boon; Tay, Yong-Haur; Goi, Bok-Min

2017-06-01

In this work, we studied a strategy for training a convolutional neural network in pedestrian gender classification with limited amount of labeled training data. Unsupervised learning by k-means clustering on pedestrian images was used to learn the filters to initialize the first layer of the network. As a form of pre-training, supervised learning for the related task of pedestrian classification was performed. Finally, the network was fine-tuned for gender classification. We found that this strategy improved the network's generalization ability in gender classification, achieving better test results when compared to random weights initialization and slightly more beneficial than merely initializing the first layer filters by unsupervised learning. This shows that unsupervised learning followed by pre-training with pedestrian images is an effective strategy to learn useful features for pedestrian gender classification.

Environmental characteristics associated with pedestrian-motor vehicle collisions in Denver, Colorado.

PubMed

Sebert Kuhlmann, Anne K; Brett, John; Thomas, Deborah; Sain, Stephan R

2009-09-01

We examined patterns of pedestrian-motor vehicle collisions and associated environmental characteristics in Denver, Colorado. We integrated publicly available data on motor vehicle collisions, liquor licenses, land use, and sociodemographic characteristics to analyze spatial patterns and other characteristics of collisions involving pedestrians. We developed both linear and spatially weighted regression models of these collisions. Spatial analysis revealed global clustering of pedestrian-motor vehicle collisions with concentrations in downtown, in a contiguous neighborhood, and along major arterial streets. Walking to work, population density, and liquor license outlet density all contributed significantly to both linear and spatial models of collisions involving pedestrians and were each significantly associated with these collisions. These models, constructed with data from Denver, identified conditions that likely contribute to patterns of pedestrian-motor vehicle collisions. Should these models be verified elsewhere, they will have implications for future research directions, public policy to enhance pedestrian safety, and public health programs aimed at decreasing unintentional injury from pedestrian-motor vehicle collisions and promoting walking as a routine physical activity.

Pedestrian facilities users guide : providing safety and mobility

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2002-03-01

The Guide provides information on how to identify safety and mobility needs of pedestrians within roadway rights-of-way. Chapter 1 provides an overview of the creation of a walkable environment. Chepter 2 describes basic pedestrian crash trends and t...

Linking pedestrian flow characteristics with stepping locomotion

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wang, Jiayue; Boltes, Maik; Seyfried, Armin; Zhang, Jun; Ziemer, Verena; Weng, Wenguo

2018-06-01

While properties of human traffic flow are described by speed, density and flow, the locomotion of pedestrian is based on steps. To relate characteristics of human locomotor system with properties of human traffic flow, this paper aims to connect gait characteristics like step length, step frequency, swaying amplitude and synchronization with speed and density and thus to build a ground for advanced pedestrian models. For this aim, observational and experimental study on the single-file movement of pedestrians at different densities is conducted. Methods to measure step length, step frequency, swaying amplitude and step synchronization are proposed by means of trajectories of the head. Mathematical models for the relations of step length or frequency and speed are evaluated. The problem how step length and step duration are influenced by factors like body height and density is investigated. It is shown that the effect of body height on step length and step duration changes with density. Furthermore, two different types of step in-phase synchronization between two successive pedestrians are observed and the influence of step synchronization on step length is examined.

Epidemiology of pedestrian-MVCs by road type in Cluj, Romania.

PubMed

Hamann, Cara; Peek-Asa, Corinne; Rus, Diana

2015-04-01

Pedestrian-motor vehicle (PMV) crash rates in Romania are among the highest in all of Europe. The purpose of this study was to examine the characteristics of pedestrian-MVCs in Cluj County, Romania, on the two major types of roadways: national or local. Cluj County police crash report data from 2010 were used to identify pedestrian, driver and crash characteristics of pedestrian-MVCs. Crashes with available location data were geocoded and road type (national or local) for each crash was determined. Distributions of crash characteristics were examined by road type and multivariable logistic regression models were built to determine predictors of crash road type. Crashes occurring on national roads involved more teenagers and adults, while those on local roads involved more young children (0-12) and older adults (65+) (p<0.01). Crashes on national roads were more likely to have marked pedestrian crossings and shoulders compared with local crashes. Pedestrian-MVCs that involved a moving violation by the motorist were more likely to occur on national roadways (adjusted OR=1.93, 95% CI 1.07 to 3.49). Pedestrian-MVCs pose a considerable health burden in Romania. Results from this study suggest that factors leading to PMV crashes on national roads are more likely to involve driver-related causes compared with local roads. Intervention priorities to reduce pedestrian crashes on national roads should be directed towards driver behaviour on national roads. Further examination of driver and pedestrian behaviours related to crash risk on both national and local roads, such as distraction and speeding, is warranted. Published by the BMJ Publishing Group Limited. For permission to use (where not already granted under a licence) please go to http://group.bmj.com/group/rights-licensing/permissions.

Examining racial bias as a potential factor in pedestrian crashes.

PubMed

Coughenour, Courtney; Clark, Sheila; Singh, Ashok; Claw, Eudora; Abelar, James; Huebner, Joshua

2017-01-01

In the US people of color are disproportionately affected by pedestrian crashes. The purpose of this study was to examine the potential for racial bias in driver yielding behaviors at midblock crosswalks in low and high income neighborhoods located in the sprawling metropolitan area of Las Vegas, NV. Participants (1 white, 1 black female) crossed at a midblock crosswalk on a multilane road in a low income and a high income neighborhood. Trained observers recorded (1) number of cars that passed in the nearest lane before yielding while the pedestrian waited near the crosswalk at the curb (2) number of cars that passed through the crosswalk with the pedestrian in the same half of the roadway. The first car in the nearest lane yielded to the pedestrian while they waited at the curb 51.5% of the time at the high income and 70.7% of the time at the low income crosswalk. Two way ANOVAs found an interaction effect between income and race on yielding behaviors. Simple effects for income revealed that at the high income crosswalk, drivers were less likely to yield to the white pedestrian while she waited at the curb (F(1,122)=11.18;p=0.001), and were less likely to yield to the black pedestrian while she was in the same half of the roadway at the high income crosswalk (F(1,124)=4.40;p=0.04). Simple effects for race showed significantly more cars passed through the crosswalk while the black pedestrian was in the roadway compared to the white pedestrian at the high income crosswalk (F(1,124)=6.62;p=0.01). Bias in driver yielding behavior may be one influencing factor in higher rates of pedestrian crashes for people of color. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Epidemiology of Pedestrian-Motor Vehicle Fatalities and Injuries, 2006-2015.

PubMed

Chong, Shu-Ling; Chiang, Li-Wei; Allen, John Carson; Fleegler, Eric William; Lee, Lois Kaye

2018-07-01

Pedestrian road safety remains a public health priority. The objective of this study is to describe trends in fatalities and injuries after pedestrian-motor vehicle collisions in the U.S. and identify associated risk factors for pedestrian fatalities. This is a cross-sectional study of U.S. pedestrian-motor vehicle collisions from 2006 to 2015 (performed in 2017). Pedestrian fatality and injury data were obtained from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's Fatality Analysis Reporting System and National Automotive Sampling System General Estimates System. Frequencies of fatalities, injuries, and associated characteristics were calculated. Multivariable logistic regression was performed for risk of fatality, controlling for demographic and crash-related factors. There were 47,789 pedestrian fatalities and 674,414 injuries during the 10-year study period. Fatality rates were highest among the elderly aged 85 years and older (2.95/100,000 population), whereas injury rates were highest for those aged 15-19 years (35.23/100,000 population). Predictors associated with increased risk for death include the following: male sex (AOR=1.36, 95% CI=1.15, 1.62), age ≥65 years (AOR=3.44, 95% CI=2.62, 4.50), alcohol involvement (AOR=2.63, 95% CI=1.88, 3.67), collisions after midnight (AOR=5.21, 95% CI=3.20, 8.49), at non-intersections (AOR=2.76, 95% CI=2.21, 3.45), and involving trucks (AOR=2.15, 95% CI=1.16, 3.97) and buses (AOR=5.82, 95% CI=3.67, 9.21). Potentially modifiable factors are associated with increased risk of death after pedestrian-motor vehicle collisions. Interventions including elder-friendly intersections and increasing visibility of pedestrians may aid in decreasing pedestrian injuries and deaths. Copyright © 2018 American Journal of Preventive Medicine. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Does Pedestrian Danger Mediate the Relationship between Local Walkability and Active Travel to Work?

PubMed

Slater, Sandy J; Nicholson, Lisa; Abu Zayd, Haytham; Chriqui, Jamie Friedman

2016-01-01

Environmental and policy factors play an important role in influencing people's lifestyles, physical activity (PA), and risks for developing obesity. Research suggests that more walkable communities are needed to sustain lifelong PA behavior, but there is a need to determine what local built environment features facilitate making being active the easy choice. This county-level study examined the association between local walkability (walkability and traffic calming scales), pedestrian danger, and the percent of adults who used active transport to work. Built environment and PA outcome measures were constructed for the 496 most populous counties representing 74% of the U.S. population. Geographic information system-based walkability scales were constructed and include a census of roads located within the counties using 2011 Navteq data. The pedestrian danger index (PDI) includes data collected from the Fatality Analysis Reporting System 2009-2011, and measures the likelihood of a pedestrian being hit and killed by a vehicle. Four continuous outcome measures were constructed using 2009-2013 American Community Survey county-level 5-year estimates. The measures represent the percentage of workers living in a county who worked away from home and (1) walked to work; (2) biked to work; (3) took public transit; and (4) used any form of active transport. Linear regression and mediation analyses were conducted to examine the association between walkability, PDI, and active transport. Models accounted for clustering within state with robust SEs, and controlled for median household income, families with children in poverty, race, ethnicity, urbanicity, and region. The walkability scale was significantly negatively associated with the PDI (β = -0.06, 95% CI = -0.111, -0.002). In all models, the PDI was significantly negatively associated with all active travel-related outcomes at the p < 0.01 level. The walkability scale was positively associated with all four

Identification of alcohol-pedestrian crash problems among selected racial/ethnic groups

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1997-09-01

Pedestrians who had been drinking make up about half of all adult pedestrian crash fatalities. About one-third of all adult pedestrian victims were at BACs of 15% or more (NHTSA's Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS), 1984-1993). This study exam...

32 CFR 636.26 - Pedestrian's rights and duties.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-07-01

... ENFORCEMENT AND CRIMINAL INVESTIGATIONS MOTOR VEHICLE TRAFFIC SUPERVISION (SPECIFIC INSTALLATIONS) Fort Stewart, Georgia § 636.26 Pedestrian's rights and duties. (a) Pedestrians will obey all traffic control devices and regulations, unless directed to do otherwise by the Military Police. (b) When traffic-control...

Identification of reluctant factors in using footpaths based on the pedestrians' perception

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hadiyanto, Wahyu; Handayani, Dewi; Yulianto, Budi

2017-06-01

Footpath is a path intended particularly for pedestrians to avoid any conflicts with motor vehicles. However in reality, most of the pedestrians are unwilling to use paths and they prefer to walk on the roads. This research was conducted with the aim to identify the existing condition of pedestrian footpaths based on field observations and to determine the factors that cause the pedestrians are reluctant to walk on the trails. The method used to investigate the pedestrians' perception was by distributing questionnaires to the pedestrians. The results of this study found that the factors that caused the pedestrians did not want to use footpaths were the footpath width, the existence of barriers and obstacles, unstable height (not continuous), damaged surface, non-standard driveway that intersects sidewalk, suboptimal function of ramp, transverse steep slope, and the absence of bollard that could protect footpaths from the access of motorcycles.

Young drivers' perception of adult and child pedestrians in potential street-crossing situations.

PubMed

Ābele, Līva; Haustein, Sonja; Møller, Mette

2018-04-03

Despite overall improvements in road traffic safety, pedestrian accidents continue to be a serious public health problem. Due to lack of experience, limited cognitive and motoric skills, and smaller size, children have a higher injury risk as pedestrians than adults. To what extent drivers adjust their driving behaviour to children's higher vulnerability is largely unknown. To determine whether young male drivers' behaviour and scanning pattern differs when approaching a child and an adult pedestrian in a potential street-crossing situation, sixty-five young (18-24) male drivers' speed, lateral position and eye movements were recorded in a driving simulator. Results showed that fewer drivers responded by slowing down and that drivers had a higher driving speed when approaching a child pedestrian, although the time of the first fixation on both types of pedestrians was the same. However, drivers drove farther away from a child than an adult pedestrian. Additionally, fewer drivers who did not slow down fixated on the speedometer while approaching the child pedestrian. The results show that young drivers behave differently when approaching a child and an adult pedestrian, though not in a way that appropriately accounts for the limitations of a child pedestrian. A better understanding of how drivers respond to different types of pedestrians and why could contribute to the development of pedestrian detection and emergency braking systems. Copyright © 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Spatial and temporal patterns of North Carolina pedestrian and bicycle plans.

PubMed

Aytur, Semra A; Rodriguez, Daniel A; Kerr, Zachary Y; Ji, Kai; Evenson, Kelly R

2013-01-01

Pedestrian and bicycle plans support community-level physical activity. In North Carolina, pedestrian/bicycle plans are becoming more prevalent. However, no studies have examined the spatial and temporal diffusion of pedestrian/bicycle plans. This study assessed (a) temporal trends associated with municipal pedestrian/bicycle planning from 1974 to 2011 and (b) spatial patterns associated with municipal plans, specifically, whether the publication of a pedestrian/bicycle plan in a given year was associated with the number of neighboring municipalities with plans. North Carolina from 1974 to 2011. The main outcome was date of publication of all North Carolina municipal pedestrian and bicycle plans (1974-2011). We calculated Euclidean distances from each municipality center to all other municipality centers to derive whether municipalities were within 20 and 50 miles of each other. Sociodemographic covariates (eg, education, grant funding status, poverty, urbanicity, racial composition, population size, population growth) were collected from the US Census of Population (1980-2010) and the American Community Survey (2006-2010). Time series models fitted by generalized estimating equations were used to assess relationships between plan presence and the temporal and spatial predictor variables. The number of pedestrian and bicycle plans significantly increased over time, especially after 2006 when a state grant funding program was initiated. Unadjusted models indicated that municipalities were significantly more likely to have a pedestrian plan if higher numbers of neighboring municipalities had pedestrian plans. After adjustment for sociodemographic covariates and funding source, this relationship was attenuated but remained statistically significant. For bicycle plans, no significant associations were observed between plan presence and the number of neighboring municipalities with bicycle plans in adjusted models. Findings from this study can be used to generate

Effects of mobile Internet use on college student pedestrian injury risk.

PubMed

Byington, Katherine W; Schwebel, David C

2013-03-01

College-age individuals have the highest incidence of pedestrian injuries of any age cohort. One factor that might contribute to elevated pedestrian injuries among this age group is injuries incurred while crossing streets distracted by mobile devices. Examine whether young adult pedestrian safety is compromised while crossing a virtual pedestrian street while distracted using the Internet on a mobile "smartphone." A within-subjects design was implemented with 92 young adults. Participants crossed a virtual pedestrian street 20 times, half the time while undistracted and half while completing an email-driven "scavenger hunt" to answer mundane questions using mobile Internet on their cell phones. Six measures of pedestrian behavior were assessed during crossings. Participants also reported typical patterns of street crossing and mobile Internet use. Participants reported using mobile Internet with great frequency in daily life, including while walking across streets. In the virtual street environment, pedestrian behavior was greatly altered and generally more risky when participants were distracted by Internet use. While distracted, participants waited longer to cross the street (F=42.37), missed more safe opportunities to cross (F=42.63), took longer to initiate crossing when a safe gap was available (F=53.03), looked left and right less often (F=124.68), spent more time looking away from the road (F=1959.78), and were more likely to be hit or almost hit by an oncoming vehicle (F=29.54; all ps<0.01). Results were retained after controlling for randomized order; participant gender, age, and ethnicity; and both pedestrian habits and mobile Internet experience. Pedestrian behavior was influenced, and generally considerably riskier, when participants were simultaneously using mobile Internet and crossing the street than when crossing the street with no distraction. This finding reinforces the need for increased awareness concerning the risks of distracted pedestrian

Investigating the risk factors associated with pedestrian injury severity in Illinois.

PubMed

Pour-Rouholamin, Mahdi; Zhou, Huaguo

2016-06-01

Pedestrians are known as the most vulnerable road users, which means their needs and safety require specific attention in strategic plans. Given the fact that pedestrians are more prone to higher injury severity levels compared to other road users, this study aims to investigate the risk factors associated with various levels of injury severity that pedestrians experience in Illinois. Ordered-response models are used to analyze single-vehicle, single-pedestrian crash data from 2010 to 2013 in Illinois. As a measure of net change in the effect of significant variables, average direct pseudo-elasticities are calculated that can be further used to prioritize safety countermeasures. A model comparison using AIC and BIC is also provided to compare the performance of the studied ordered-response models. The results recognized many variables associated with severe injuries: older pedestrians (more than 65years old), pedestrians not wearing contrasting clothing, adult drivers (16-24), drunk drivers, time of day (20:00 to 05:00), divided highways, multilane highways, darkness, and heavy vehicles. On the other hand, crossing the street at crosswalks, older drivers (more than 65years old), urban areas, and presence of traffic control devices (signal and sign) are associated with decreased probability of severe injuries. The comparison between three proposed ordered-response models shows that the partial proportional odds (PPO) model outperforms the conventional ordered (proportional odds-PO) model and generalized ordered logit model (GOLM). Based on the findings, stricter rules to address DUI driving is suggested. Educational programs need to focus on older pedestrians given the increasing number of older people in Illinois in the upcoming years. Pedestrians should be educated to use pedestrian crosswalks and contrasting clothing at night. In terms of engineering countermeasures, installation of crosswalks where pedestrian activity is high seems a promising practice

Effects of Mobile Internet Use On College Student Pedestrian Injury Risk

PubMed Central

Byington, Katherine W.; Schwebel, David C.

2012-01-01

Background College-age individuals have the highest incidence of pedestrian injuries of any age cohort. One factor that might contribute to elevated pedestrian injuries among this age group is injuries incurred while crossing streets distracted by mobile devices. Objectives Examine whether young adult pedestrian safety is compromised while crossing a virtual pedestrian street while distracted using the internet on a mobile “smartphone.” Method A within-subjects design was implemented with 92 young adults. Participants crossed a virtual pedestrian street 20 times, half the time while undistracted and half while completing an email-driven “scavenger hunt” to answer mundane questions using mobile internet on their cell phones. Six measures of pedestrian behavior were assessed during crossings. Participants also reported typical patterns of street crossing and mobile internet use. Results Participants reported using mobile internet with great frequency in daily life, including while walking across streets. In the virtual street environment, pedestrian behavior was greatly altered and generally more risky when participants were distracted by internet use. While distracted, participants waited longer to cross the street (F = 42.37), missed more safe opportunities to cross (F = 42.63), took longer to initiate crossing when a safe gap was available (F = 53.03), looked left and right less often (F = 124.68), spent more time looking away from the road (F = 1959.78), and were more likely to be hit or almost hit by an oncoming vehicle (F = 29.54; all ps< 0.01). Results were retained after controlling for randomized order; participant gender, age, and ethnicity; and both pedestrian habits and mobile internet experience. Conclusion Pedestrian behavior was influenced, and generally considerably riskier, when participants were simultaneously using mobile internet and crossing the street than when crossing the street with no distraction. This finding reinforces the need for

[Automobile versus pedestrian accidents analysis by fixed-parameters computer simulation].

PubMed

Mao, Ming-Yuan; Chen, Yi-Jiu; Liu, Ning-Guo; Zou, Dong-Hua; Liu, Jun-Yong; Jin, Xian-Long

2008-04-01

Using computer simulation to analyze the effects of speed, type of automobile and impacted position on crash-course and injuries of pedestrians in automobile vs. pedestrian accidents. Automobiles (bus, minibus, car and truck) and pedestrian models were constructed with multi-body dynamics computing method. The crashes were simulated at different impact speeds (20, 30, 40, 50 and 60 km/h) and different positions (front, lateral and rear of pedestrians). Crash-courses and their biomechanical responses were studied. If the type of automobile and impact position were the same, the crash-courses were similar (impact speed < or = 60 km/h). There were some characteristics in the head acceleration, upper neck axial force and leg axial force. Multi-body dynamics computer simulation of crash can be applied to analyze crash-course and injuries (head, neck and leg) of pedestrians.

Study on bi-directional pedestrian movement using ant algorithms

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sibel, Gokce; Ozhan, Kayacan

2016-01-01

A cellular automata model is proposed to simulate bi-directional pedestrian flow. Pedestrian movement is investigated by using ant algorithms. Ants communicate with each other by dropping a chemical, called a pheromone, on the substrate while crawling forward. Similarly, it is considered that oppositely moving pedestrians drop ‘visual pheromones’ on their way and the visual pheromones might cause attractive or repulsive interactions. This pheromenon is introduced into modelling the pedestrians’ walking preference. In this way, the decision-making process of pedestrians will be based on ‘the instinct of following’. At some densities, the relationships of velocity-density and flux-density are analyzed for different evaporation rates of visual pheromones. Lane formation and phase transition are observed for certain evaporation rates of visual pheromones.

Improving pedestrian facilities in congested urban areas: a case study of Chennai city

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Subramanyam, B.; Prasanna Kumar, R.

2017-07-01

Traffic congestion and lack of public pedestrian space are some problems faced by most urban metropolises. Conventionally walking has been a mode of transportation in Indian cities. The percentage of pedestrians may vary from 16 to 57 depending upon the city. Encounters between vehicular traffic and pedestrian traffic are at its rise currently. Rapid industrialization and urbanization in India has resulted in neglecting of pedestrian facilities. Consequently pedestrian are at greater risk for their safety more especially in the commercial zones of large cities. A change in perspective spotlight will create a sense of awareness that the pedestrian traffic is also vital as the vehicular traffic. Soothing the traffic would moderately cut the driving expediency but the pedestrians will get a much safer and peaceful route to their terminuses. Safety and comfort are the two pans of a balance while considering the pedestrian traffic. Considering these aspects, this study deals a study in improving pedestrian facilities by analysing the existing skeleton of the selected locations. The adequacy of facility is checked based on IRC latest guidelines and counteractive measures are postulated.

Accidental Bolt Gun Injury to Femur - A Case Report.

PubMed

Kattimani, Ravi Prasad; Shetty, Sanath; Mirza, Humayun

2016-01-01

Bolt gun or slaughterer's guns are used in meat industry for "humane killing" of animals. Injuries caused by bolt gun are rare, reported exclusively from central European countries. We report a case of 28 year old male, who accidentally shot himself with a bolt gun to his right thigh. A 28 years old male presented to our Accident and Emergency department after accidental injury to his right thigh with bolt gun. He had an entry wound measuring 2 cm in length and 1 cm in breadth over anterior aspect of lower one third of thigh at lower and sustained Grade II compound fracture of right femur shaft at distal one third. The wound was treated with multiple debridements, negative pressure wound therapy and intravenous antibiotics based on culture and sensitivity. Bolt gun or slaughterer's guns are weapons used in meat industry for slaughtering animals. Wounds inflicted by bolt guns have specific morphological feature, distinctive from wounds made by other kinds of hand firearms. Most of the time wound will be infected at presentation. Lesions caused by these weapons are likely to have a more serious character than is to be expected from the size of the entrance wound. The mainstay of treatment is liberal wound exploration, multiple debridement's and intra venous antibiotics based on culture reports to treat infection and prevent morbidity.

Effects of Different Levels of Refractive Blur on Nighttime Pedestrian Visibility.

PubMed

Wood, Joanne M; Marszalek, Ralph; Carberry, Trent; Lacherez, Philippe; Collins, Michael J

2015-07-01

The aim of this study was to systematically investigate the effect of different levels of refractive blur and driver age on nighttime pedestrian recognition and determine whether clothing that has been shown to improve pedestrian conspicuity is robust to the effects of blur. Nighttime pedestrian recognition was measured for 24 visually normal participants (12 younger mean = 24.9 ± 4.5 years and 12 older adults mean = 77.6 ± 5.7 years) for three levels of binocular blur (+0.50 diopter [D], +1.00 D, +2.00 D) compared with baseline (optimal refractive correction). Pedestrians walked in place on a closed road circuit and wore one of three clothing conditions: everyday clothing, a retro-reflective vest, and retro-reflective tape positioned on the extremities in a configuration that conveyed biological motion (known as "biomotion"); the order of conditions was randomized among participants. Pedestrian recognition distances were recorded for each blur and pedestrian clothing combination while participants drove an instrumented vehicle around a closed road course. The recognition distances for pedestrians were significantly reduced (P < 0.05) by all levels of blur compared with baseline. Pedestrians wearing biomotion clothing were recognized at significantly longer distances than for the other clothing configurations in all blur conditions. However, these effects were smaller for the older adults, who had much shorter recognition distances for all conditions tested. In summary, even small amounts of blur had a significant detrimental effect on nighttime pedestrian recognition. Biomotion retro-reflective clothing was effective, even under moderately degraded visibility conditions, for both young and older drivers.

Measuring accident risk exposure for pedestrians in different micro-environments.

PubMed

Lassarre, Sylvain; Papadimitriou, Eleonora; Yannis, George; Golias, John

2007-11-01

Pedestrians are mainly exposed to the risk of road accident when crossing a road in urban areas. Traditionally in the road safety field, the risk of accident for pedestrian is estimated as a rate of accident involvement per unit of time spent on the road network. The objective of this research is to develop an approach of accident risk based on the concept of risk exposure used in environmental epidemiology, such as in the case of exposure to pollutants. This type of indicator would be useful for comparing the effects of urban transportation policy scenarios on pedestrian safety. The first step is to create an indicator of pedestrians' exposure, which is based on motorised vehicles' "concentration" by lane and also takes account of traffic speed and time spent to cross. This is applied to two specific micro-environments: junctions and mid-block locations. A model of pedestrians' crossing behaviour along a trip is then developed, based on a hierarchical choice between junctions and mid-block locations and taking account of origin and destination, traffic characteristics and pedestrian facilities. Finally, a complete framework is produced for modelling pedestrians' exposure in the light of their crossing behaviour. The feasibility of this approach is demonstrated on an artificial network and a first set of results is obtained from the validation of the models in observational studies.

[Parental practices and pedestrian risk behaviors in Chilean adolescents].

PubMed

Herrera, Andrea C; Repetto, Paula B

2014-08-01

Traffic accidents are the second leading cause of death among adolescents and young adults in Chile. However, few studies have examined this behavior among this age group. Parental practices have a great influence on risk behaviors in adolescents, such as substance use, sexuality and violence, among others. Specifically, we propose that these practices will influence pedestrian risk behaviors among adolescents. To study the role of parental practices such as mother and father support, and behavioral control (monitoring and presence of rules) in pedestrian risk behaviors of teenagers. A sample of 470 adolescents attending schools in the Metropolitan Region of Santiago, Chile were studied. They answered a self-administered questionnaire in which they were asked about parental practices and pedestrian risk behaviors. Analyses were performed using descriptive and inferential statistics, using multiple regression. Paternal support and the presence of rules were protective factors for pedestrian risky behaviors. However, maternal support or monitoring did not influence these behaviors. Parental practices influence pedestrian behaviors of teenagers. The study provides further evidence for the importance of these practices in the development of behavioral self-regulation.

The flashing right turn signal with pedestrian indication : human factors studies to understand the potential of a new signal to increase awareness of and attention to crossing pedestrians.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2015-12-01

The flashing pedestrian indicator (FPI) is intended to alert turning drivers to the potential presence of : pedestrians in the roadway, facilitate scanning in the likely direction of pedestrians, and encourage caution and : yielding behavior in respo...

Universal Power Law Governing Pedestrian Interactions

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Karamouzas, Ioannis; Skinner, Brian; Guy, Stephen J.

2014-12-01

Human crowds often bear a striking resemblance to interacting particle systems, and this has prompted many researchers to describe pedestrian dynamics in terms of interaction forces and potential energies. The correct quantitative form of this interaction, however, has remained an open question. Here, we introduce a novel statistical-mechanical approach to directly measure the interaction energy between pedestrians. This analysis, when applied to a large collection of human motion data, reveals a simple power-law interaction that is based not on the physical separation between pedestrians but on their projected time to a potential future collision, and is therefore fundamentally anticipatory inmore » nature. Remarkably, this simple law is able to describe human interactions across a wide variety of situations, speeds, and densities. We further show, through simulations, that the interaction law we identify is sufficient to reproduce many known crowd phenomena.« less

Automatic Pedestrian Crossing Detection and Impairment Analysis Based on Mobile Mapping System

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Liu, X.; Zhang, Y.; Li, Q.

2017-09-01

Pedestrian crossing, as an important part of transportation infrastructures, serves to secure pedestrians' lives and possessions and keep traffic flow in order. As a prominent feature in the street scene, detection of pedestrian crossing contributes to 3D road marking reconstruction and diminishing the adverse impact of outliers in 3D street scene reconstruction. Since pedestrian crossing is subject to wearing and tearing from heavy traffic flow, it is of great imperative to monitor its status quo. On this account, an approach of automatic pedestrian crossing detection using images from vehicle-based Mobile Mapping System is put forward and its defilement and impairment are analyzed in this paper. Firstly, pedestrian crossing classifier is trained with low recall rate. Then initial detections are refined by utilizing projection filtering, contour information analysis, and monocular vision. Finally, a pedestrian crossing detection and analysis system with high recall rate, precision and robustness will be achieved. This system works for pedestrian crossing detection under different situations and light conditions. It can recognize defiled and impaired crossings automatically in the meanwhile, which facilitates monitoring and maintenance of traffic facilities, so as to reduce potential traffic safety problems and secure lives and property.

Evaluation of Pedestrian Hybrid Beacons and Rapid Flashing Beacons

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2016-07-01

Two pedestrian treatments receiving national attention are the rectangular rapid-flashing beacon (RRFB) and the pedestrian hybrid beacon (PHB). These devices have unique characteristics that produce improved vehicle stopping and yielding to crossing ...

7 CFR 503.12 - Vehicular and pedestrian traffic.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-01-01

... 7 Agriculture 6 2011-01-01 2011-01-01 false Vehicular and pedestrian traffic. 503.12 Section 503.12 Agriculture Regulations of the Department of Agriculture (Continued) AGRICULTURAL RESEARCH SERVICE, DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE CONDUCT ON PLUM ISLAND ANIMAL DISEASE CENTER § 503.12 Vehicular and pedestrian...

7 CFR 503.12 - Vehicular and pedestrian traffic.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-01-01

... 7 Agriculture 6 2012-01-01 2012-01-01 false Vehicular and pedestrian traffic. 503.12 Section 503.12 Agriculture Regulations of the Department of Agriculture (Continued) AGRICULTURAL RESEARCH SERVICE, DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE CONDUCT ON PLUM ISLAND ANIMAL DISEASE CENTER § 503.12 Vehicular and pedestrian...

7 CFR 503.12 - Vehicular and pedestrian traffic.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-01-01

... 7 Agriculture 6 2013-01-01 2013-01-01 false Vehicular and pedestrian traffic. 503.12 Section 503.12 Agriculture Regulations of the Department of Agriculture (Continued) AGRICULTURAL RESEARCH SERVICE, DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE CONDUCT ON PLUM ISLAND ANIMAL DISEASE CENTER § 503.12 Vehicular and pedestrian...

7 CFR 503.12 - Vehicular and pedestrian traffic.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-01-01

... 7 Agriculture 6 2014-01-01 2014-01-01 false Vehicular and pedestrian traffic. 503.12 Section 503.12 Agriculture Regulations of the Department of Agriculture (Continued) AGRICULTURAL RESEARCH SERVICE, DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE CONDUCT ON PLUM ISLAND ANIMAL DISEASE CENTER § 503.12 Vehicular and pedestrian...

Crossroads: Modern Interactive Intersections and Accessible Pedestrian Signals

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Barlow, Janet M.; Franck, Lukas

2005-01-01

This article discusses the interactive nature of modern actuated intersections and the effect of that interface on pedestrians who are visually impaired. Information is provided about accessible pedestrian signals (APS), the role of blindness professionals in APS installation decisions, and techniques for crossing streets with APS.

Macro-level safety analysis of pedestrian crashes in Shanghai, China.

PubMed

Wang, Xuesong; Yang, Junguang; Lee, Chris; Ji, Zhuoran; You, Shikai

2016-11-01

Pedestrian safety has become one of the most important issues in the field of traffic safety. This study aims at investigating the association between pedestrian crash frequency and various predictor variables including roadway, socio-economic, and land-use features. The relationships were modeled using the data from 263 Traffic Analysis Zones (TAZs) within the urban area of Shanghai - the largest city in China. Since spatial correlation exists among the zonal-level data, Bayesian Conditional Autoregressive (CAR) models with seven different spatial weight features (i.e. (a) 0-1 first order, adjacency-based, (b) common boundary-length-based, (c) geometric centroid-distance-based, (d) crash-weighted centroid-distance-based, (e) land use type, adjacency-based, (f) land use intensity, adjacency-based, and (g) geometric centroid-distance-order) were developed to characterize the spatial correlations among TAZs. Model results indicated that the geometric centroid-distance-order spatial weight feature, which was introduced in macro-level safety analysis for the first time, outperformed all the other spatial weight features. Population was used as the surrogate for pedestrian exposure, and had a positive effect on pedestrian crashes. Other significant factors included length of major arterials, length of minor arterials, road density, average intersection spacing, percentage of 3-legged intersections, and area of TAZ. Pedestrian crashes were higher in TAZs with medium land use intensity than in TAZs with low and high land use intensity. Thus, higher priority should be given to TAZs with medium land use intensity to improve pedestrian safety. Overall, these findings can help transportation planners and managers understand the characteristics of pedestrian crashes and improve pedestrian safety. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Potential field cellular automata model for pedestrian flow

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhang, Peng; Jian, Xiao-Xia; Wong, S. C.; Choi, Keechoo

2012-02-01

This paper proposes a cellular automata model of pedestrian flow that defines a cost potential field, which takes into account the costs of travel time and discomfort, for a pedestrian to move to an empty neighboring cell. The formulation is based on a reconstruction of the density distribution and the underlying physics, including the rule for resolving conflicts, which is comparable to that in the floor field cellular automaton model. However, we assume that each pedestrian is familiar with the surroundings, thereby minimizing his or her instantaneous cost. This, in turn, helps reduce the randomness in selecting a target cell, which improves the existing cellular automata modelings, together with the computational efficiency. In the presence of two pedestrian groups, which are distinguished by their destinations, the cost distribution for each group is magnified due to the strong interaction between the two groups. As a typical phenomenon, the formation of lanes in the counter flow is reproduced.

Scaling laws in granular flow and pedestrian flow

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chen, Shumiao; Alonso-Marroquin, Fernando; Busch, Jonathan; Hidalgo, Raúl Cruz; Sathianandan, Charmila; Ramírez-Gómez, Álvaro; Mora, Peter

2013-06-01

We use particle-based simulations to examine the flow of particles through an exit. Simulations involve both gravity-driven particles (representing granular material) and velocity-driven particles (mimicking pedestrian dynamics). Contact forces between particles include elastic, viscous, and frictional forces; and simulations use bunker geometry. Power laws are observed in the relation between flow rate and exit width. Simulations of granular flow showed that the power law has little dependence on the coefficient of friction. Polydisperse granular systems produced higher flow rates than those produced by monodisperse ones. We extend the particle model to include the main features of pedestrian dynamics: thoracic shape, shoulder rotation, and desired velocity oriented towards the exit. Higher desired velocity resulted in higher flow rate. Granular simulations always give higher flow rate than pedestrian simulations, despite the values of aspect ratio of the particles. In terms of force distribution, pedestrians and granulates share similar properties with the non-democratic distribution of forces that poses high risks of injuries in a bottleneck situation.

Pedestrian Detection and Tracking from Low-Resolution Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Thermal Imagery

PubMed Central

Ma, Yalong; Wu, Xinkai; Yu, Guizhen; Xu, Yongzheng; Wang, Yunpeng

2016-01-01

Driven by the prominent thermal signature of humans and following the growing availability of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), more and more research efforts have been focusing on the detection and tracking of pedestrians using thermal infrared images recorded from UAVs. However, pedestrian detection and tracking from the thermal images obtained from UAVs pose many challenges due to the low-resolution of imagery, platform motion, image instability and the relatively small size of the objects. This research tackles these challenges by proposing a pedestrian detection and tracking system. A two-stage blob-based approach is first developed for pedestrian detection. This approach first extracts pedestrian blobs using the regional gradient feature and geometric constraints filtering and then classifies the detected blobs by using a linear Support Vector Machine (SVM) with a hybrid descriptor, which sophisticatedly combines Histogram of Oriented Gradient (HOG) and Discrete Cosine Transform (DCT) features in order to achieve accurate detection. This research further proposes an approach for pedestrian tracking. This approach employs the feature tracker with the update of detected pedestrian location to track pedestrian objects from the registered videos and extracts the motion trajectory data. The proposed detection and tracking approaches have been evaluated by multiple different datasets, and the results illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed methods. This research is expected to significantly benefit many transportation applications, such as the multimodal traffic performance measure, pedestrian behavior study and pedestrian-vehicle crash analysis. Future work will focus on using fused thermal and visual images to further improve the detection efficiency and effectiveness. PMID:27023564

Pedestrian Detection and Tracking from Low-Resolution Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Thermal Imagery.

PubMed

Ma, Yalong; Wu, Xinkai; Yu, Guizhen; Xu, Yongzheng; Wang, Yunpeng

2016-03-26

Driven by the prominent thermal signature of humans and following the growing availability of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), more and more research efforts have been focusing on the detection and tracking of pedestrians using thermal infrared images recorded from UAVs. However, pedestrian detection and tracking from the thermal images obtained from UAVs pose many challenges due to the low-resolution of imagery, platform motion, image instability and the relatively small size of the objects. This research tackles these challenges by proposing a pedestrian detection and tracking system. A two-stage blob-based approach is first developed for pedestrian detection. This approach first extracts pedestrian blobs using the regional gradient feature and geometric constraints filtering and then classifies the detected blobs by using a linear Support Vector Machine (SVM) with a hybrid descriptor, which sophisticatedly combines Histogram of Oriented Gradient (HOG) and Discrete Cosine Transform (DCT) features in order to achieve accurate detection. This research further proposes an approach for pedestrian tracking. This approach employs the feature tracker with the update of detected pedestrian location to track pedestrian objects from the registered videos and extracts the motion trajectory data. The proposed detection and tracking approaches have been evaluated by multiple different datasets, and the results illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed methods. This research is expected to significantly benefit many transportation applications, such as the multimodal traffic performance measure, pedestrian behavior study and pedestrian-vehicle crash analysis. Future work will focus on using fused thermal and visual images to further improve the detection efficiency and effectiveness.

Spatial-size scaling of pedestrian groups under growing density conditions

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zanlungo, Francesco; Brščić, Dražen; Kanda, Takayuki

2015-06-01

We study the dependence on crowd density of the spatial size, configuration, and velocity of pedestrian social groups. We find that, in the investigated density range, the extension of pedestrian groups in the direction orthogonal to that of motion decreases linearly with the pedestrian density around them, both for two- and three-person groups. Furthermore, we observe that at all densities, three-person groups walk slower than two-person groups, and the latter are slower than individual pedestrians, the differences in velocities being weakly affected by density. Finally, we observe that three-person groups walk in a V-shaped formation regardless of density, with a distance between the pedestrians in the front and back again almost independent of density, although the configuration appears to be less stable at higher densities. These findings may facilitate the development of more realistic crowd dynamics models and simulators.

Capacity analysis of pedestrian facilities involving individuals with disabilities.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2015-08-31

Walking facilities are important infrastructures that must be designed to accommodate the behavior of pedestrians in order to be effective. Heterogeneity in pedestrian composition is one important factor generally overlooked in walking facility desig...

Impact of social and technological distraction on pedestrian crossing behaviour: an observational study

PubMed Central

Thompson, Leah L; Rivara, Frederick P; Ayyagari, Rajiv C; Ebel, Beth E

2013-01-01

Objectives The objective of the present work was to study the impact of technological and social distraction on cautionary behaviours and crossing times in pedestrians. Methods Pedestrians were observed at 20 high-risk intersections during 1 of 3 randomly assigned time windows in 2012. Observers recorded demographic and behavioural information, including use of a mobile device (talking on the phone, text messaging, or listening to music). We examined the association between distraction and crossing behaviours, adjusting for age and gender. All multivariate analyses were conducted with random effect logistic regression (binary outcomes) and random effect linear regression (continuous outcomes), accounting for clustering by site. Results Observers recorded crossing behaviours for 1102 pedestrians. Nearly one-third (29.8%) of all pedestrians performed a distracting activity while crossing. Distractions included listening to music (11.2%), text messaging (7.3%) and using a handheld phone (6.2%). Text messaging, mobile phone use and talking with a companion increased crossing time. Texting pedestrians took 1.87 additional seconds (18.0%) to cross the average intersection (3.4 lanes), compared to undistracted pedestrians. Texting pedestrians were 3.9 times more likely than undistracted pedestrians to display at least 1 unsafe crossing behaviour (disobeying the lights, crossing mid-intersection, or failing to look both ways). Pedestrians listening to music walked more than half a second (0.54) faster across the average intersection than undistracted pedestrians. Conclusions Distracting activity is common among pedestrians, even while crossing intersections. Technological and social distractions increase crossing times, with text messaging associated with the highest risk. Our findings suggest the need for intervention studies to reduce risk of pedestrian injury. PMID:23243104

Step styles of pedestrians at different densities

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wang, Jiayue; Weng, Wenguo; Boltes, Maik; Zhang, Jun; Tordeux, Antoine; Ziemer, Verena

2018-02-01

Stepping locomotion is the basis of human movement. The investigation of stepping locomotion and its affecting factors is necessary for a more realistic knowledge of human movement, which is usually referred to as walking with equal step lengths for the right and left leg. To study pedestrians’ stepping locomotion, a set of single-file movement experiments involving 39 participants of the same age walking on a highly curved oval course is conducted. The microscopic characteristics of the pedestrians including 1D Voronoi density, speed, and step length are calculated based on a projected coordinate. The influence of the projection lines with different radii on the measurement of these quantities is investigated. The step lengths from the straight and curved parts are compared using the Kolmogorov-Smirnov test. During the experiments, six different step styles are observed and the proportions of different step styles change with the density. At low density, the main step style is the stable-large step style and the step lengths of one pedestrian are almost constant. At high density, some pedestrians adjust and decrease their step lengths. Some pedestrians take relatively smaller and larger steps alternately to adapt to limited space.

Influence of approaching tram on behaviour of pedestrians in signalised crosswalks in Poland.

PubMed

Kruszyna, Maciej; Rychlewski, Jeremi

2013-06-01

Research done in two Polish cities has uncovered an influence of an approaching tram on pedestrian behaviour. The measurements were done by counting pedestrians waiting for a green signal, crossing on red signal safely, or crossing on red signal taking a risk of being hit by a car, differentiating between pedestrians attempting to board a public transport vehicle and other pedestrians. It was expected, that pedestrian behaviour might be influenced by traffic control predictability, therefore two cities were chosen for the task: Wrocław with fixed time traffic control and Poznań with a majority of traffic responsive traffic signals. Data from the measurements was compared in order to find behaviour patterns - the comparison led to a conclusion, that an attempt to get on board of an incoming public transport vehicle can be a major cause for pedestrians to violate a red signal, including an increase of unsafe behaviour. These pedestrians may provoke other pedestrians to cross on a red signal. On the other hand if traffic control guarantees boarding the public transport vehicle, passengers-to-be may be even more obedient than other pedestrians. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Simulation study of overtaking in pedestrian flow using floor field cellular automaton model

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Fu, Zhijian; Xia, Liang; Yang, Hongtai; Liu, Xiaobo; Ma, Jian; Luo, Lin; Yang, Lizhong; Chen, Junmin

Properties of pedestrian may change along the moving path, for example, as a result of fatigue or injury, which has never been properly investigated in the past research. The paper attempts to study tactical overtaking in pedestrian flow. That is difficult to be modeled using a microscopic discrete model because of the complexity of the detailed overtaking behavior, and crossing/overlaps of pedestrian routes. Thus, a multi-velocity floor field cellular automaton model explaining the detailed psychical process of overtaking decision was proposed. Pedestrian can be either in normal state or in tactical overtaking state. Without tactical decision, pedestrians in normal state are driven by the floor field. Pedestrians make their tactical overtaking decisions by evaluating the walking environment around the overtaking route (the average velocity and density around the route, visual field of pedestrian) and obstructing conditions (the distance and velocity difference between the overtaking pedestrian and the obstructing pedestrian). The effects of tactical overtaking ratio, free velocity dispersion, and visual range on fundamental diagram, conflict density, and successful overtaking ratio were explored. Besides, the sensitivity analysis of the route factor relative intensity was performed.

Teaching Pedestrian Skills to Individuals with Developmental Disabilities

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Batu, Sema; Ergenekon, Yasemin; Erbas, Dilek; Akmanoglu, Nurgul

2004-01-01

The purpose of the present study was to examine the effectiveness of most to least prompting on teaching pedestrian skills to individuals with developmental disabilities. Five individuals with developmental disabilities were taught three different pedestrian skills, all related to crossing the streets, using simulation activities on a road model…

Program evaluation of FHWA pedestrian and bicycle safety activities.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2011-03-01

"Introduction : FHWAs Office of Highway Safety (HSA) initiated a program evaluation by Booz Allen Hamilton to assess the overall effectiveness of the Agencys Pedestrian and Bicycle Safety Program. The evaluation covers pedestrian and bicycle sa...

Spatiotemporal approaches to analyzing pedestrian fatalities: the case of Cali, Colombia.

PubMed

Fox, Lani; Serre, Marc L; Lippmann, Steven J; Rodríguez, Daniel A; Bangdiwala, Shrikant I; Gutiérrez, María Isabel; Escobar, Guido; Villaveces, Andrés

2015-01-01

Injuries among pedestrians are a major public health concern in Colombian cities such as Cali. This is one of the first studies in Latin America to apply Bayesian maximum entropy (BME) methods to visualize and produce fine-scale, highly accurate estimates of citywide pedestrian fatalities. The purpose of this study is to determine the BME method that best estimates pedestrian mortality rates and reduces statistical noise. We further utilized BME methods to identify and differentiate spatial patterns and persistent versus transient pedestrian mortality hotspots. In this multiyear study, geocoded pedestrian mortality data from the Cali Injury Surveillance System (2008 to 2010) and census data were utilized to accurately visualize and estimate pedestrian fatalities. We investigated the effects of temporal and spatial scales, addressing issues arising from the rarity of pedestrian fatality events using 3 BME methods (simple kriging, Poisson kriging, and uniform model Bayesian maximum entropy). To reduce statistical noise while retaining a fine spatial and temporal scale, data were aggregated over 9-month incidence periods and censal sectors. Based on a cross-validation of BME methods, Poisson kriging was selected as the best BME method. Finally, the spatiotemporal and urban built environment characteristics of Cali pedestrian mortality hotspots were linked to intervention measures provided in Mead et al.'s (2014) pedestrian mortality review. The BME space-time analysis in Cali resulted in maps displaying hotspots of high pedestrian fatalities extending over small areas with radii of 0.25 to 1.1 km and temporal durations of 1 month to 3 years. Mapping the spatiotemporal distribution of pedestrian mortality rates identified high-priority areas for prevention strategies. The BME results allow us to identify possible intervention strategies according to the persistence and built environment of the hotspot; for example, through enforcement or long-term environmental

[Analysis of accidental deaths in mountain tourism and sport according to statistics from the Republic of Kabardino-Balkariia].

PubMed

Mechukaev, A M; Mechukaev, A A

2006-01-01

Lethal cases in mountain tourism and sports in the Republic of Kabardino-Balkaria were studied for 1978-1995. A total of 152 accidental deaths were analysed. Most of the victims were males under 30 years of age. The greatest number of the accidents took place on Monday, in July and August. Many amateur visitors from abroad were among the victims. The main cause of death in the mountains of Kabardino-Balkaria for the 18 years studied was multitrauma of the body (69.7%). Hypothermia and obturation asphyxia with snow and compression asphyxia due to snowbreak account for 11.8 and 13.2% deaths, respectively; lightning killed 4%. Combination of high mountain hypoxia with exacerbated chronic somatic disease or hypothermia caused death in 1% victims. The authors propose how to improve forensic-medical expert examination of accidental death and safety in the mountains.

Pilot Study: A Pediatric Pedestrian Safety Curriculum for Preschool Children.

PubMed

Bovis, Stephanie E; Harden, Taijha; Hotz, Gillian

2016-01-01

To evaluate and implement the WalkSafe Pre-Kindergarten Pedestrian Safety Curriculum. A quasi-experimental pretest-posttest design without a control group was used to measure children's pedestrian safety knowledge. Knowledge assessments consisting of multiple-choice and short-answer questions were administered pre- and post-curriculum implementation by classroom teachers. Knowledge assessments gauged prekindergarten students' knowledge of pedestrian safety activities prior to safety curriculum implementation and, again, after the students received the curriculum. A total of 605 children (aged 3- to 5-year) from 38 prekindergarten classrooms in 16 randomly selected elementary schools participated in the pedestrian safety education pilot program. Subjects were of multiethnic and diverse backgrounds from the Miami-Dade County Public School District. Of the 605 educated subjects, 454 children completed both pre- and posttests. A statistically significant difference was found between pretest knowledge (M = 5.49, SD = 1.54) and posttest knowledge (M = 6.64, SD = 1.35) assessment scores across all 454 subjects, t(452) = -16.22, p < .001, 95% CI [-1.29, -1.01]. Previous studies have shown that classroom-based training of children as young as 4 years old can yield significant improvements in traffic safety knowledge. The statistical findings of the WalkSafe Pre-Kindergarten Pedestrian Safety Curriculum revealed statistically significant improvements in pedestrian safety knowledge of these young children. Future research efforts will focus on longitudinal behavioral changes in these students and an increase in pedestrian safety behaviors (e.g., utilization of crosswalks or sidewalks).

Effects of Switching Behavior for the Attraction on Pedestrian Dynamics.

PubMed

Kwak, Jaeyoung; Jo, Hang-Hyun; Luttinen, Tapio; Kosonen, Iisakki

2015-01-01

Walking is a fundamental activity of our daily life not only for moving to other places but also for interacting with surrounding environment. While walking on the streets, pedestrians can be aware of attractions like shopping windows. They can be influenced by the attractions and some of them might shift their attention towards the attractions, namely switching behavior. As a first step to incorporate the switching behavior, this study investigates collective effects of switching behavior for an attraction by developing a behavioral model. Numerical simulations exhibit different patterns of pedestrian behavior depending on the strength of the social influence and the average length of stay. When the social influence is strong along with a long length of stay, a saturated phase can be defined at which all the pedestrians have visited the attraction. If the social influence is not strong enough, an unsaturated phase appears where one can observe that some pedestrians head for the attraction while others walk in their desired direction. These collective patterns of pedestrian behavior are summarized in a phase diagram by comparing the number of pedestrians who visited the attraction to the number of passersby near the attraction. Measuring the marginal benefits with respect to the strength of the social influence and the average length of stay enables us to identify under what conditions enhancing these variables would be more effective. The findings from this study can be understood in the context of the pedestrian facility management, for instance, for retail stores.

An entropy model to measure heterogeneity of pedestrian crowds using self-propelled agents

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rangel-Huerta, A.; Ballinas-Hernández, A. L.; Muñoz-Meléndez, A.

2017-05-01

An entropy model to characterize the heterogeneity of a pedestrian crowd in a counter-flow corridor is presented. Pedestrians are modeled as self-propelled autonomous agents that are able to perform maneuvers to avoid collisions based on a set of simple rules of perception and action. An observer can determine a probability distribution function of the displayed behavior of pedestrians based only on external information. Three types of pedestrian are modeled, relaxed, standard and hurried pedestrians depending on their preferences of turn and non-turn when walking. Thus, using these types of pedestrians two crowds can be simulated: homogeneous and heterogeneous crowds. Heterogeneity is measured in this research based on the entropy in function of time. For that, the entropy of a homogeneous crowd comprising standard pedestrians is used as reference. A number of simulations to measure entropy of pedestrian crowds were conducted by varying different combinations of types of pedestrians, initial simulation conditions of macroscopic flow, as well as density of the crowd. Results from these simulations show that our entropy model is sensitive enough to capture the effect of both the initial simulation conditions about the spatial distribution of pedestrians in a corridor, and the composition of a crowd. Also, a relevant finding is that entropy in function of density presents a phase transition in the critical region.

An evidence based method to calculate pedestrian crossing speeds in vehicle collisions (PCSC).

PubMed

Bastien, C; Wellings, R; Burnett, B

2018-06-07

Pedestrian accident reconstruction is necessary to establish cause of death, i.e. establishing vehicle collision speed as well as circumstances leading to the pedestrian being impacted and determining culpability of those involved for subsequent court enquiry. Understanding the complexity of the pedestrian attitude during an accident investigation is necessary to ascertain the causes leading to the tragedy. A generic new method, named Pedestrian Crossing Speed Calculator (PCSC), based on vector algebra, is proposed to compute the pedestrian crossing speed at the moment of impact. PCSC uses vehicle damage and pedestrian anthropometric dimensions to establish a combination of head projection angles against the windscreen; this angle is then compared against the combined velocities angle created from the vehicle and the pedestrian crossing speed at the time of impact. This method has been verified using one accident fatality case in which the exact vehicle and pedestrian crossing speeds were known from Police forensic video analysis. PCSC was then applied on two other accident scenarios and correctly corroborated with the witness statements regarding the pedestrians crossing behaviours. The implications of PCSC could be significant once fully validated against further future accident data, as this method is reversible, allowing the computation of vehicle impact velocity from pedestrian crossing speed as well as verifying witness accounts. Copyright © 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Application of demographic analysis to pedestrian safety : final report.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2017-04-01

In recent years, many departments of transportation in the US have invested additional resources to enhance : pedestrian safety. However, there is still a need to effectively and systematically address the pedestrian experience : in low-income areas....

Pedestrian Safety Treatments for Signalized Intersections : Training Course Development

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2017-11-01

When drivers make left turns during a permissive turn phase, they must yield to pedestrians as well as oncoming through vehicles. Left-turning drivers sometimes overlook pedestrians in the crosswalk while watching the opposing intersection approach. ...

Literature review on vehicle travel speeds and pedestrian injuries

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1999-10-01

The relationship between vehicle travel speeds and resulting pedestrian injury was reviewed in the literature and in existing data sets. Results indicated that higher vehicle speeds are strongly associated with both a greater likelihood of pedestrian...

Investigation of pedestrian crashes on two-way two-lane rural roads in Ethiopia.

PubMed

Tulu, Getu Segni; Washington, Simon; Haque, Md Mazharul; King, Mark J

2015-05-01

Understanding pedestrian crash causes and contributing factors in developing countries is critically important as they account for about 55% of all traffic crashes. Not surprisingly, considerable attention in the literature has been paid to road traffic crash prediction models and methodologies in developing countries of late. Despite this interest, there are significant challenges confronting safety managers in developing countries. For example, in spite of the prominence of pedestrian crashes occurring on two-way two-lane rural roads, it has proven difficult to develop pedestrian crash prediction models due to a lack of both traffic and pedestrian exposure data. This general lack of available data has further hampered identification of pedestrian crash causes and subsequent estimation of pedestrian safety performance functions. The challenges are similar across developing nations, where little is known about the relationship between pedestrian crashes, traffic flow, and road environment variables on rural two-way roads, and where unique predictor variables may be needed to capture the unique crash risk circumstances. This paper describes pedestrian crash safety performance functions for two-way two-lane rural roads in Ethiopia as a function of traffic flow, pedestrian flows, and road geometry characteristics. In particular, random parameter negative binomial model was used to investigate pedestrian crashes. The models and their interpretations make important contributions to road crash analysis and prevention in developing countries. They also assist in the identification of the contributing factors to pedestrian crashes, with the intent to identify potential design and operational improvements. Copyright © 2015. Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Rapid detection and identification of pedestrian impacts using a distributed sensor network

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kim, Andrew C.; Chang, Fu-Kuo

2005-05-01

Pedestrian fatalities from automobile accidents often occur as a result of head injuries suffered from impacts with an automobile front end. Active pedestrian protection systems with proper pedestrian recognition algorithms can protect pedestrians from such head trauma. An investigation was conducted to assess the feasibility of using a network of piezoelectric sensors mounted on the front bumper beam of an automobile to discriminate between impacts with "pedestrian" and "non-pedestrian" objects. This information would be used to activate a safety device (e.g., external airbag or pop-up hood) to provide protection for the vulnerable pedestrian. An analytical foundation for the object-bumper impact problem will be presented, as well as the classical beam impact theory. The mechanical waves that propagate in the structure from an external impact contain a wealth of information about the specifics of a particular impact -- object mass, size, impact speed, etc. -- but most notably the object stiffness, which identifies the impacted object. Using the frequency content of the sensor signals, it can be shown that impacts with a "pedestrian" object of varying size, weight, and speed can be easily differentiated from impacts with other "non-pedestrian" objects. Simulation results will illustrate this phenomenon, and experimental tests will verify the results. A comprehensive series of impact tests were performed for validation, using both a stationary front bumper with a drop-pendulum impactor and a moving car with stationary impact objects. Results from both tests will be presented.

Research, development, and implementation of pedestrian safety facilities in the United Kingdom

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1999-12-01

This report is one in a series of pedestrian safety synthesis reports prepared for the Federal Highway Administration to document pedestrian safety in other countries. This report reviews recent research on pedestrian safety carried out in the United...

A review of pedestrian safety research in the United States and abroad

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2003-11-01

The purpose of this report is to provide an overview of research studies on pedestrian safety in the United States; some foreign research also is included. Readers will find details of pedestrian crash characteristics, measures of pedestrian exposure...

Increasing of visibility on the pedestrian crossing by the additional lighting systems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Baleja, Richard; Bos, Petr; Novak, Tomas; Sokansky, Karel; Hanusek, Tomas

2017-09-01

Pedestrian crossings are critical places for road accidents between pedestrians and motor vehicles. For this reason, it is very important to increase attention when the pedestrian crossings are designed and it is necessary to take into account all factors that may contribute to higher safety. Additional lighting systems for pedestrian crossings are one of them and the lighting systems must fulfil the requirements for higher visibility from the point of view of car drivers from both directions. This paper describes the criteria for the suitable additional lighting system on pedestrian crossings. Generally, it means vertical illuminance on the pedestrian crossing from the driver’s view, horizontal illuminance on the crossing and horizontal illuminance both in front of and behind the crossing placed on the road and their acceptable ratios. The article also describes the choice of the colours of the light (correlated colour temperature) and its influence on visibility. As a part of the article, there are case designs of additional lighting systems for pedestrian crossings and measurements from realized additional lighting systems by luxmeters and luminance cameras and their evaluation.

Feature Selection and Pedestrian Detection Based on Sparse Representation.

PubMed

Yao, Shihong; Wang, Tao; Shen, Weiming; Pan, Shaoming; Chong, Yanwen; Ding, Fei

2015-01-01

Pedestrian detection have been currently devoted to the extraction of effective pedestrian features, which has become one of the obstacles in pedestrian detection application according to the variety of pedestrian features and their large dimension. Based on the theoretical analysis of six frequently-used features, SIFT, SURF, Haar, HOG, LBP and LSS, and their comparison with experimental results, this paper screens out the sparse feature subsets via sparse representation to investigate whether the sparse subsets have the same description abilities and the most stable features. When any two of the six features are fused, the fusion feature is sparsely represented to obtain its important components. Sparse subsets of the fusion features can be rapidly generated by avoiding calculation of the corresponding index of dimension numbers of these feature descriptors; thus, the calculation speed of the feature dimension reduction is improved and the pedestrian detection time is reduced. Experimental results show that sparse feature subsets are capable of keeping the important components of these six feature descriptors. The sparse features of HOG and LSS possess the same description ability and consume less time compared with their full features. The ratios of the sparse feature subsets of HOG and LSS to their full sets are the highest among the six, and thus these two features can be used to best describe the characteristics of the pedestrian and the sparse feature subsets of the combination of HOG-LSS show better distinguishing ability and parsimony.

A least-effort principle based model for heterogeneous pedestrian flow considering overtaking behavior

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Liu, Chi; Ye, Rui; Lian, Liping; Song, Weiguo; Zhang, Jun; Lo, Siuming

2018-05-01

In the context of global aging, how to design traffic facilities for a population with a different age composition is of high importance. For this purpose, we propose a model based on the least effort principle to simulate heterogeneous pedestrian flow. In the model, the pedestrian is represented by a three-disc shaped agent. We add a new parameter to realize pedestrians' preference to avoid changing their direction of movement too quickly. The model is validated with numerous experimental data on unidirectional pedestrian flow. In addition, we investigate the influence of corridor width and velocity distribution of crowds on unidirectional heterogeneous pedestrian flow. The simulation results reflect that widening corridors could increase the specific flow for the crowd composed of two kinds of pedestrians with significantly different free velocities. Moreover, compared with a unified crowd, the crowd composed of pedestrians with great mobility differences requires a wider corridor to attain the same traffic efficiency. This study could be beneficial in providing a better understanding of heterogeneous pedestrian flow, and quantified outcomes could be applied in traffic facility design.

Finding strategies to improve pedestrian safety in rural areas

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2001-10-11

This paper is based upon an analysis of collisions involving pedestrians in rural areas and proposes ways of preventing them. Pedestrian and vehicle volumes were counted and crash numbers predicted and compared to outcomes in varying environments. It...

Injury tolerance of tibia for the car-pedestrian impact.

PubMed

Mo, Fuhao; Arnoux, Pierre Jean; Jure, Jean Jaques; Masson, Catherine

2012-05-01

Lower limbs are normally the first contacted body region during car-pedestrian accidents, and easily suffer serious injuries. The previous tibia bending tolerances for pedestrian safety were mainly developed from three-point bending tests on tibia mid-shaft. The tibia tolerances of other locations are still not investigated enough. In addition, tibia loading condition under the car-pedestrian impact should be explored to compare with the three-point bending. This work aims to investigate the injury tolerance of tibia fracture with combined experimental data and numerical simulation. Eleven new reported quasi-static bending tests of tibia mid-shaft, and additional eleven dynamic mid-shaft bending test results in the previous literature were used to define injury risk functions. Furthermore, to investigate the influence of tibia locations on bending tolerance, finite element simulations with lower limb model were implemented according to three-point bending and pedestrian impact conditions. The regressive curve of tibia bending tolerance was obtained from the simulations on the different impact locations, and indicated that tibia fracture tolerance could vary largely due to the impact locations for the car-pedestrian crash. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

The role of fluctuations and interactions in pedestrian dynamics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Corbetta, Alessandro; Meeusen, Jasper; Benzi, Roberto; Lee, Chung-Min; Toschi, Federico

Understanding quantitatively the statistical behaviour of pedestrians walking in crowds is a major scientific challenge of paramount societal relevance. Walking humans exhibit a rich (stochastic) dynamics whose small and large deviations are driven, among others, by own will as well as by environmental conditions. Via 24/7 automatic pedestrian tracking from multiple overhead Microsoft Kinect depth sensors, we collected large ensembles of pedestrian trajectories (in the order of tens of millions) in different real-life scenarios. These scenarios include both narrow corridors and large urban hallways, enabling us to cover and compare a wide spectrum of typical pedestrian dynamics. We investigate the pedestrian motion measuring the PDFs, e.g. those of position, velocity and acceleration, and at unprecedentedly high statistical resolution. We consider the dependence of PDFs on flow conditions, focusing on diluted dynamics and pair-wise interactions (''collisions'') for mutual avoidance. By means of Langevin-like models we provide models for the measured data, inclusive typical fluctuations and rare events. This work is part of the JSTP research programme ``Vision driven visitor behaviour analysis and crowd management'' with Project Number 341-10-001, which is financed by the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO).

Modeling detour behavior of pedestrian dynamics under different conditions

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Qu, Yunchao; Xiao, Yao; Wu, Jianjun; Tang, Tao; Gao, Ziyou

2018-02-01

Pedestrian simulation approach has been widely used to reveal the human behavior and evaluate the performance of crowd evacuation. In the existing pedestrian simulation models, the social force model is capable of predicting many collective phenomena. Detour behavior occurs in many cases, and the important behavior is a dominate factor of the crowd evacuation efficiency. However, limited attention has been attracted for analyzing and modeling the characteristics of detour behavior. In this paper, a modified social force model integrated by Voronoi diagram is proposed to calculate the detour direction and preferred velocity. Besides, with the consideration of locations and velocities of neighbor pedestrians, a Logit-based choice model is built to describe the detour direction choice. The proposed model is applied to analyze pedestrian dynamics in a corridor scenario with either unidirectional or bidirectional flow, and a building scenario in real-world. Simulation results show that the modified social force model including detour behavior could reduce the frequency of collision and deadlock, increase the average speed of the crowd, and predict more practical crowd dynamics with detour behavior. This model can also be potentially applied to understand the pedestrian dynamics and design emergent management strategies for crowd evacuations.

Is "Safety-in-numbers" theory applies to the pattern of pedestrian accidents in Seoul, South Korea.

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Choi, Y.; Yoon, H.

2016-12-01

Every year, about 1.25 million people die of vehicle-related accidents, among which half are pedestrians with higher vulnerability: pedestrian, cyclists and motorcyclist (World Health Organization, 2016). This urges city governments in the world to strive for pedestrian safety and to apply diverse theories to transportation planning and design. The common belief is that the number of pedestrian accidents is directly and positively associated with the volume of pedestrian, however, another hypothesis, called "safety-in-numbers" effect, tells an opposite story in that accident rates declines with increase of the volume of pedestrian. In this study, we examine first, whether the safety-in-numbers theory applies to the pattern of pedestrian accidents in Seoul, and second, further investigate environmental factors that are associated with the pedestrian safety. On the first count, we use geospatial statistical analyses of the multi-year pedestrian accident data collected by Korea Road Traffic Authority (KoRoad) and the pedestrian volume data collected by SK Telecom (SKT). With Kernel Density Estimation and Bivariate Local Moran's I, we identify spatial clustering of pedestrian accidents in the city, and examine whether those locations match with concentrations of pedestrian volume. On the second count, we use statistical analysis, tobit, poisson and negative binomial regression to investigate relationships between pedestrian volume and number of pedestrian accident for the two types of geographic areas by the results of the aforementioned analysis; Area 1- locations of high volume of pedestrian with high number of accident, Area 2- locations of high volume of pedestrian with low number of accident. For environmental factors potentially explaining pedestrian accidents, we include land use composition, number of traffic lanes, crosswalk presence, pedestrian signal, traffic island and sidewalk width in our analysis. This research will be valuable in city governments

The impact of pedestrian countdown signals on pedestrian-motor vehicle collisions: a reanalysis of data from a quasi-experimental study.

PubMed

Richmond, Sarah A; Willan, Andrew R; Rothman, Linda; Camden, Andi; Buliung, Ron; Macarthur, Colin; Howard, Andrew

2014-06-01

To perform a more sophisticated analysis of previously published data that advances the understanding of the efficacy of pedestrian countdown signal (PCS) installation on pedestrian-motor vehicle collisions (PMVCs), in the city of Toronto, Canada. This is an updated analysis of the same dataset from Camden et al. A quasi-experimental design was used to evaluate the effect of PCS on PMVC. A Poisson regression analysis, using a one-group comparison of PMVC, pre-PCS installation to post-PCS installation was used, controlling for season and temporal effects. The outcome was the frequency of reported PMVC (January 2000-December 2009). Similar models were used to analyse specific types of collisions defined by age of pedestrian, injury severity, and pedestrian and vehicle action. Incidence rate ratios with 95% CI are presented. This analysis included 9262 PMVC, 2760 during or after PCS installation, at 1965 intersections. There was a 26% increase in the rate of collisions, pre to post-PCS installation (incidence rate ratio=1.26, 95% CI 1.11 to 1.42). The installation of PCS at 1965 signalised intersections in the city of Toronto resulted in an increase in PMVC rates post-PCS installation. PCSs may have an unintended consequence of increasing pedestrian-motor vehicle collisions in some settings. Published by the BMJ Publishing Group Limited. For permission to use (where not already granted under a licence) please go to http://group.bmj.com/group/rights-licensing/permissions.

14 CFR 139.329 - Pedestrians and ground vehicles.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-01-01

... by an employee, tenant, or contractor; (c) When an air traffic control tower is in operation, ensure... between the tower and the pedestrian, vehicle, or escort; (d) When an air traffic control tower is not in operation, or there is no air traffic control tower, provide adequate procedures to control pedestrians and...

32 CFR 636.26 - Pedestrian's rights and duties.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-07-01

... shoulder of the roadway as far from the edge of the roadway as possible. When neither sidewalks nor a shoulder are available, pedestrians will walk on the extreme edge of the roadway, facing traffic, and will... pedestrians or joggers while walking or jogging on roadways or on the shoulders of roadways is prohibited. ...

32 CFR 636.26 - Pedestrian's rights and duties.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-07-01

... shoulder of the roadway as far from the edge of the roadway as possible. When neither sidewalks nor a shoulder are available, pedestrians will walk on the extreme edge of the roadway, facing traffic, and will... pedestrians or joggers while walking or jogging on roadways or on the shoulders of roadways is prohibited. ...

32 CFR 636.26 - Pedestrian's rights and duties.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-07-01

... shoulder of the roadway as far from the edge of the roadway as possible. When neither sidewalks nor a shoulder are available, pedestrians will walk on the extreme edge of the roadway, facing traffic, and will... pedestrians or joggers while walking or jogging on roadways or on the shoulders of roadways is prohibited. ...

32 CFR 636.26 - Pedestrian's rights and duties.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-07-01

... shoulder of the roadway as far from the edge of the roadway as possible. When neither sidewalks nor a shoulder are available, pedestrians will walk on the extreme edge of the roadway, facing traffic, and will... pedestrians or joggers while walking or jogging on roadways or on the shoulders of roadways is prohibited. ...

Development, implementation and evaluation of a pedestrian safety zone for elderly pedestrians

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1998-02-01

The objectives of this study were to develop and apply procedures for defining pedestrian safety zones for the older (age 65+) adult and to develop, implement and evaluate a countermeasure program in the defined zones. Zone definition procedures were...

Potential for the dynamics of pedestrians in a socially interacting group

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zanlungo, Francesco; Ikeda, Tetsushi; Kanda, Takayuki

2014-01-01

We introduce a simple potential to describe the dynamics of the relative motion of two pedestrians socially interacting in a walking group. We show that the proposed potential, based on basic empirical observations and theoretical considerations, can qualitatively describe the statistical properties of pedestrian behavior. In detail, we show that the two-dimensional probability distribution of the relative distance is determined by the proposed potential through a Boltzmann distribution. After calibrating the parameters of the model on the two-pedestrian group data, we apply the model to three-pedestrian groups, showing that it describes qualitatively and quantitatively well their behavior. In particular, the model predicts that three-pedestrian groups walk in a V-shaped formation and provides accurate values for the position of the three pedestrians. Furthermore, the model correctly predicts the average walking velocity of three-person groups based on the velocity of two-person ones. Possible extensions to larger groups, along with alternative explanations of the social dynamics that may be implied by our model, are discussed at the end of the paper.

How do attitudes, personality traits, and driver behaviors relate to pedestrian behaviors?: A Turkish case.

PubMed

Şimşekoğlu, Özlem

2015-01-01

The present study aimed to investigate the role of pedestrian attitudes and personality traits (social conformity and empathy) on pedestrian behaviors in a Turkish sample. An equally important aim of the study was to examine the association between pedestrian and driver behaviors. The sample included 289 road users including pedestrians and drivers (169 females and 120 males). The participants' age ranged from 15 to 78 years (M = 32.00, SD = 13.89). Data were collected using a self-administered questionnaire. A regression analysis showed that increased age, high level of satisfaction with traffic infrastructure and environment, safer attitudes toward pedestrian violations, and empathy were negatively related to risky pedestrian behaviors, whereas social conformity was positively related. Attitudes were the strongest predictor of pedestrian behaviors. In addition, bivariate correlation analysis showed that all dimensions of pedestrian and driver behaviors were positively correlated with each other, which indicates that a tendency to take risks remains the same regardless of the road user role (i.e., driver vs. pedestrian). Attitudes are strong predictors of pedestrian behaviors. A tendency to take risks as a pedestrian and as a driver is correlated. Results are discussed for their implications to traffic safety campaigns targeting increased pedestrian safety.

Considering built environment and spatial correlation in modeling pedestrian injury severity.

PubMed

Prato, Carlo G; Kaplan, Sigal; Patrier, Alexandre; Rasmussen, Thomas K

2018-01-02

This study looks at mitigating and aggravating factors that are associated with the injury severity of pedestrians when they have crashes with another road user and overcomes existing limitations in the literature by focusing attention on the built environment and considering spatial correlation across crashes. Reports for 6,539 pedestrian crashes occurred in Denmark between 2006 and 2015 were merged with geographic information system resources containing detailed information about the built environment and exposure at the crash locations. A linearized spatial logit model estimated the probability of pedestrians sustaining a severe or fatal injury conditional on the occurrence of a crash with another road user. This study confirms previous findings about older pedestrians and intoxicated pedestrians being the most vulnerable road users and crashes with heavy vehicles and in roads with higher speed limits being related to the most severe outcomes. This study provides novel perspectives by showing positive spatial correlations of crashes with the same severity outcomes and emphasizing the role of the built environment in the proximity of the crash. This study emphasizes the need for thinking about traffic calming measures, illumination solutions, road maintenance programs, and speed limit reductions. Moreover, this study emphasizes the role of the built environment, because shopping areas, residential areas, and walking traffic density are positively related to a reduction in pedestrian injury severity. Often, these areas have in common a larger pedestrian mass that is more likely to make other road users more aware and attentive, whereas the same does not seem to apply to areas with lower pedestrian density.

Effects of Switching Behavior for the Attraction on Pedestrian Dynamics

PubMed Central

Kwak, Jaeyoung; Jo, Hang-Hyun; Luttinen, Tapio; Kosonen, Iisakki

2015-01-01

Walking is a fundamental activity of our daily life not only for moving to other places but also for interacting with surrounding environment. While walking on the streets, pedestrians can be aware of attractions like shopping windows. They can be influenced by the attractions and some of them might shift their attention towards the attractions, namely switching behavior. As a first step to incorporate the switching behavior, this study investigates collective effects of switching behavior for an attraction by developing a behavioral model. Numerical simulations exhibit different patterns of pedestrian behavior depending on the strength of the social influence and the average length of stay. When the social influence is strong along with a long length of stay, a saturated phase can be defined at which all the pedestrians have visited the attraction. If the social influence is not strong enough, an unsaturated phase appears where one can observe that some pedestrians head for the attraction while others walk in their desired direction. These collective patterns of pedestrian behavior are summarized in a phase diagram by comparing the number of pedestrians who visited the attraction to the number of passersby near the attraction. Measuring the marginal benefits with respect to the strength of the social influence and the average length of stay enables us to identify under what conditions enhancing these variables would be more effective. The findings from this study can be understood in the context of the pedestrian facility management, for instance, for retail stores. PMID:26218430

Dynamic analysis of pedestrian crossing behaviors on traffic flow at unsignalized mid-block crosswalks

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Liu, Gang; He, Jing; Luo, Zhiyong; Yang, Wunian; Zhang, Xiping

2015-05-01

It is important to study the effects of pedestrian crossing behaviors on traffic flow for solving the urban traffic jam problem. Based on the Nagel-Schreckenberg (NaSch) traffic cellular automata (TCA) model, a new one-dimensional TCA model is proposed considering the uncertainty conflict behaviors between pedestrians and vehicles at unsignalized mid-block crosswalks and defining the parallel updating rules of motion states of pedestrians and vehicles. The traffic flow is simulated for different vehicle densities and behavior trigger probabilities. The fundamental diagrams show that no matter what the values of vehicle braking probability, pedestrian acceleration crossing probability, pedestrian backing probability and pedestrian generation probability, the system flow shows the "increasing-saturating-decreasing" trend with the increase of vehicle density; when the vehicle braking probability is lower, it is easy to cause an emergency brake of vehicle and result in great fluctuation of saturated flow; the saturated flow decreases slightly with the increase of the pedestrian acceleration crossing probability; when the pedestrian backing probability lies between 0.4 and 0.6, the saturated flow is unstable, which shows the hesitant behavior of pedestrians when making the decision of backing; the maximum flow is sensitive to the pedestrian generation probability and rapidly decreases with increasing the pedestrian generation probability, the maximum flow is approximately equal to zero when the probability is more than 0.5. The simulations prove that the influence of frequent crossing behavior upon vehicle flow is immense; the vehicle flow decreases and gets into serious congestion state rapidly with the increase of the pedestrian generation probability.

4 CFR 25.13 - Vehicular and pedestrian traffic.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-01-01

... OFFICE BUILDING AND ON ITS GROUNDS § 25.13 Vehicular and pedestrian traffic. (a) Drivers of all vehicles... at all times and shall comply with all posted traffic signs and with the signals and directions of... 4 Accounts 1 2010-01-01 2010-01-01 false Vehicular and pedestrian traffic. 25.13 Section 25.13...

31 CFR 700.10 - Vehicular and pedestrian traffic.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-07-01

... pedestrian traffic. (a) Drivers of all vehicles on the property shall drive in a careful and safe manner at all times and shall comply with the signals and directions of security officers and all posted traffic... 31 Money and Finance: Treasury 3 2010-07-01 2010-07-01 false Vehicular and pedestrian traffic. 700...

How do children learn to cross the street? The process of pedestrian safety training

PubMed Central

Schwebel, David C.; Shen, Jiabin; McClure, Leslie A.

2016-01-01

Objective Pedestrian injuries are a leading cause of child death, and may be reduced by training children to cross streets more safely. Such training is most effective when children receive repeated practice at the complex cognitive-perceptual task of judging moving traffic and selecting safe crossing gaps, but there is limited data on how much practice is required for children to reach adult levels of functioning. Using existing data, we examined how children’s pedestrian skill changed over the course of six pedestrian safety training sessions, each comprised of 45 crossings within a virtual pedestrian environment. Methods As part of a randomized controlled trial on pedestrian safety training, 59 children ages 7-8 crossed the street within a semi-immersive virtual pedestrian environment 270 times over a 3-week period (6 sessions of 45 crossings each). Feedback was provided after each crossing, and traffic speed and density was advanced as children’s skill improved. Post-intervention pedestrian behavior was assessed a week later in the virtual environment and compared to adult behavior with identical traffic patterns. Results Over the course of training, children entered traffic gaps more quickly and chose tighter gaps to cross within; their crossing efficiency appeared to increase. By the end of training, some aspects of children’s pedestrian behavior was comparable to adult behavior but other aspects were not, indicating the training was worthwhile but insufficient for most children to achieve adult levels of functioning. Conclusions Repeated practice in a simulated pedestrian environment helps children learn aspects of safe and efficient pedestrian behavior. Six twice-weekly training sessions of 45 crossings each were insufficient for children to reach adult pedestrian functioning, however, and future research should continue to study the trajectory and quantity of child pedestrian safety training needed for children to become competent pedestrians. PMID

7 CFR 502.12 - Vehicular and pedestrian traffic.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-01-01

... § 502.12 Vehicular and pedestrian traffic. (a) Drivers of all vehicles whether or not motorized in or on BARC property shall drive in a careful and safe manner at all times and shall comply with the signals... 7 Agriculture 6 2010-01-01 2010-01-01 false Vehicular and pedestrian traffic. 502.12 Section 502...

Tracking Algorithm of Multiple Pedestrians Based on Particle Filters in Video Sequences

PubMed Central

Liu, Yun; Wang, Chuanxu; Zhang, Shujun; Cui, Xuehong

2016-01-01

Pedestrian tracking is a critical problem in the field of computer vision. Particle filters have been proven to be very useful in pedestrian tracking for nonlinear and non-Gaussian estimation problems. However, pedestrian tracking in complex environment is still facing many problems due to changes of pedestrian postures and scale, moving background, mutual occlusion, and presence of pedestrian. To surmount these difficulties, this paper presents tracking algorithm of multiple pedestrians based on particle filters in video sequences. The algorithm acquires confidence value of the object and the background through extracting a priori knowledge thus to achieve multipedestrian detection; it adopts color and texture features into particle filter to get better observation results and then automatically adjusts weight value of each feature according to current tracking environment. During the process of tracking, the algorithm processes severe occlusion condition to prevent drift and loss phenomena caused by object occlusion and associates detection results with particle state to propose discriminated method for object disappearance and emergence thus to achieve robust tracking of multiple pedestrians. Experimental verification and analysis in video sequences demonstrate that proposed algorithm improves the tracking performance and has better tracking results. PMID:27847514

Child pedestrian supervision/guidance

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1983-01-01

The purpose of this study was to identify and evaluate the pedestrian accident risk associated with play activities performed in and near the street, as well as other situational characteristics, and to develop accident countermeasures emphasizing su...

Child and Adult Pedestrian Impact: The Influence of Vehicle Type on Injury Severity

PubMed Central

Henary, Basem Y.; Crandall, Jeff; Bhalla, Kavi; Mock, Charles N.; Roudsari, Bahman S.

2003-01-01

In the United States, the vehicle fleet is shifting from predominantly passenger cars (automobiles) to SUVs, light trucks, and vans (LTV). This study investigates how pedestrian severe injury and mortality are associated with vehicle type and pedestrian age. The Pedestrian Crash Data Study (PCDS) database for years 1994–1998 was used for a cross-sectional study design. Outcome measures were Injury Severity Score, Maximum Abbreviated Injury Score, Abbreviated Injury Scale, Pedestrian Mortality, Functional Capacity Index and Life Years Lost to Injury. Compared to children, adult pedestrians were more likely to sustain severe injury (OR = 2.81; 95% CI: 1.56–5.06) or mortality (OR = 2.91; 95% CI: 1.10–7.74) when examining all vehicle types. However, after adjusting for vehicle type and impact speed, this association was not statistically significant at p < 0.05. Compared to passenger cars, pedestrians struck by LTV were more likely to have severe injuries (OR = 1.31; 95% CI: 0.88–1.94) or mortality (OR = 1.40; 95% CI: 0.84–2.34) for all pedestrians. Adjusting for pedestrian age, this association was more obvious and significant at lower impact speeds (≤ 30 km/h); odds ratios of severe injury and mortality were 3.34 (p< 0.01) and 1.87 (p= 0.07), respectively. Adults hit by LTV had the highest risk of injury and mortality. These findings indicate that pedestrian age, vehicle engineering design and impact speed are highly contributing to risks of pedestrian injury and mortality. PMID:12941221

Small-size pedestrian detection in large scene based on fast R-CNN

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wang, Shengke; Yang, Na; Duan, Lianghua; Liu, Lu; Dong, Junyu

2018-04-01

Pedestrian detection is a canonical sub-problem of object detection with high demand during recent years. Although recent deep learning object detectors such as Fast/Faster R-CNN have shown excellent performance for general object detection, they have limited success for small size pedestrian detection in large-view scene. We study that the insufficient resolution of feature maps lead to the unsatisfactory accuracy when handling small instances. In this paper, we investigate issues involving Fast R-CNN for pedestrian detection. Driven by the observations, we propose a very simple but effective baseline for pedestrian detection based on Fast R-CNN, employing the DPM detector to generate proposals for accuracy, and training a fast R-CNN style network to jointly optimize small size pedestrian detection with skip connection concatenating feature from different layers to solving coarseness of feature maps. And the accuracy is improved in our research for small size pedestrian detection in the real large scene.

Study on queueing behavior in pedestrian evacuation by extended cellular automata model

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hu, Jun; You, Lei; Zhang, Hong; Wei, Juan; Guo, Yangyong

2018-01-01

This paper proposes a pedestrian evacuation model for effective simulation of evacuation efficiency based on extended cellular automata. In the model, pedestrians' momentary transition probability to a target position is defined in terms of the floor field and queueing time, and the critical time is defined as the waiting time threshold in a queue. Queueing time and critical time are derived using Fractal Brownian Motion through analysis of pedestrian arrival characteristics. Simulations using the platform and actual evacuations were conducted to study the relationships among system evacuation time, average system velocity, pedestrian density, flow rate, and critical time. The results demonstrate that at low pedestrian density, evacuation efficiency can be improved through adoption of the shortest route strategy, and critical time has an inverse relationship with average system velocity. Conversely, at higher pedestrian densities, it is better to adopt the shortest queueing time strategy, and critical time is inversely related to flow rate.

Development of Mobile Accessible Pedestrian Signals (MAPS) for Blind Pedestrians at Signalized Intersections

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2011-06-01

People with vision impairment have different perception and spatial cognition as compared to the sighted people. Blind pedestrians primarily rely on auditory, olfactory, or tactile feedback to determine spatial location and find their way. They gener...

Temporal and Fine-Grained Pedestrian Action Recognition on Driving Recorder Database

PubMed Central

Satoh, Yutaka; Aoki, Yoshimitsu; Oikawa, Shoko; Matsui, Yasuhiro

2018-01-01

The paper presents an emerging issue of fine-grained pedestrian action recognition that induces an advanced pre-crush safety to estimate a pedestrian intention in advance. The fine-grained pedestrian actions include visually slight differences (e.g., walking straight and crossing), which are difficult to distinguish from each other. It is believed that the fine-grained action recognition induces a pedestrian intention estimation for a helpful advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS). The following difficulties have been studied to achieve a fine-grained and accurate pedestrian action recognition: (i) In order to analyze the fine-grained motion of a pedestrian appearance in the vehicle-mounted drive recorder, a method to describe subtle change of motion characteristics occurring in a short time is necessary; (ii) even when the background moves greatly due to the driving of the vehicle, it is necessary to detect changes in subtle motion of the pedestrian; (iii) the collection of large-scale fine-grained actions is very difficult, and therefore a relatively small database should be focused. We find out how to learn an effective recognition model with only a small-scale database. Here, we have thoroughly evaluated several types of configurations to explore an effective approach in fine-grained pedestrian action recognition without a large-scale database. Moreover, two different datasets have been collected in order to raise the issue. Finally, our proposal attained 91.01% on National Traffic Science and Environment Laboratory database (NTSEL) and 53.23% on the near-miss driving recorder database (NDRDB). The paper has improved +8.28% and +6.53% from baseline two-stream fusion convnets. PMID:29461473

Features of microscopic pedestrian movement in a panic situation based on cellular automata model

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ibrahim, Najihah; Hassan, Fadratul Hafinaz

2017-10-01

Pedestrian movement is the one of the subset for the crowd management under simulation objective. During panic situation, pedestrian usually will create a microscopic movement that lead towards the self-organization. During self-organizing, the behavioral and physical factors had caused the mass effect on the pedestrian movement. The basic CA model will create a movement path for each pedestrian over a time step. However, due to the factors immerge, the CA model needs some enhancement that will establish a real simulation state. Hence, this concept paper will discuss on the enhanced features of CA model for microscopic pedestrian movement during panic situation for a better pedestrian simulation.

Public acceptability of highway safety countermeasures : volume IV, pedestrian measures.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1981-06-01

This volume is part of a larger study providing information about public attitudes : towards proposed highway safety countermeasures in three program areas: alcohol : and drugs, unsafe driving behaviors, and pedestrian safety. Pedestrian safety : cou...

Pedestrian headways - Reflection of territorial social forces

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Krbálek, Milan; Hrabák, Pavel; Bukáček, Marek

2018-01-01

The aim of the article is to give a more detailed insight into territorial social forces acting between pedestrians by means of headway distribution and spectral rigidity. Probabilistic distribution of time headways between consecutive pedestrians is studied theoretically and experimentally. Several original experiments/empirical observations are presented and compared to data obtained from previously published experiments. The study is restricted to an unidirectional one-lane motion where overtaking is forbidden. The main stress is put on natural choices of mutual interaction represented by logarithmic and hyperbolic potentials leading to gamma and generalized inverse Gaussian distribution respectively. We show that the time headway distribution does not sufficiently reflect the differences between such distributions. The tools related to spectral rigidity and compressibility are chosen instead so as to predict the territorial social forces more accurately. Surprisingly, pedestrian flow seems to show a higher level of synchronization (lower compressibility) than vehicular flow.

A Case Study on the Walking Speed of Pedestrian at the Bus Terminal Area

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Firdaus Mohamad Ali, Mohd; Salleh Abustan, Muhamad; Hidayah Abu Talib, Siti; Abustan, Ismail; Rahman, Noorhazlinda Abd; Gotoh, Hitoshi

2018-03-01

Walking speed is one of the factors in understanding the pedestrian walking behaviours. Every pedestrian has different level of walking speed that are regulated by some factors such as gender and age. This study was conducted at a bus terminal area with two objectives in which the first one was to determine the average walking speed of pedestrian by considering the factors of age, gender, people with and without carrying baggage; and the second one was to make a comparison of the average walking speed that considered age as the factor of comparison between pedestrian at the bus terminal area and crosswalk. Demographic factor of pedestrian walking speed in this study are gender and age consist of male, female, and 7 groups of age categories that are children, adult men and women, senior adult men and women, over 70 and disabled person. Data of experiment was obtained by making a video recording of the movement of people that were walking and roaming around at the main lobby for 45 minutes by using a camcorder. Hence, data analysis was done by using software named Human Behaviour Simulator (HBS) for analysing the data extracted from the video. The result of this study was male pedestrian walked faster than female with the average of walking speed 1.13m/s and 1.07m/s respectively. Averagely, pedestrian that walked without carrying baggage had higher walking speed compared to pedestrian that were carrying baggage with the speed of 1.02m/s and 0.70m/s respectively. Male pedestrian walks faster than female because they have higher level of stamina and they are mostly taller than female pedestrian. Furthermore, pedestrian with baggage walks slower because baggage will cause distractions such as pedestrian will have more weight to carry and people tend to walk slower.

The visibility and comprehension of pedestrian traffic signals : summary report

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1997-06-01

The research objectives were to determine performance criteria for acceptable pedestrian signal visibility and to study the comprehension of innovative and standard pedestrian signals. Two field studies and a video questionnaire were designed and imp...

Training Children in Pedestrian Safety: Distinguishing Gains in Knowledge from Gains in Safe Behavior

PubMed Central

McClure, Leslie A.

2014-01-01

Pedestrian injuries contribute greatly to child morbidity and mortality. Recent evidence suggests that training within virtual pedestrian environments may improve children’s street crossing skills, but may not convey knowledge about safety in street environments. We hypothesized that (a) children will gain pedestrian safety knowledge via videos/software/internet websites, but not when trained by virtual pedestrian environment or other strategies; (b) pedestrian safety knowledge will be associated with safe pedestrian behavior both before and after training; and (c) increases in knowledge will be associated with increases in safe behavior among children trained individually at streetside locations, but not those trained by means of other strategies. We analyzed data from a randomized controlled trial evaluating pedestrian safety training. We randomly assigned 240 children ages 7–8 to one of four training conditions: videos/software/internet, virtual reality (VR), individualized streetside instruction, or a no-contact control. Both virtual and field simulations of street crossing at 2-lane bi-directional mid-block locations assessed pedestrian behavior at baseline, post-training, and 6-month follow-up. Pedestrian knowledge was assessed orally on all three occasions. Children trained by videos/software/internet, and those trained individually, showed increased knowledge following training relative to children in the other groups (ps < 0.01). Correlations between pedestrian safety knowledge and pedestrian behavior were mostly non-significant. Correlations between change in knowledge and change in behavior from pre- to post-intervention also were non-significant, both for the full sample and within conditions. Children trained using videos/software/internet gained knowledge but did not change their behavior. Children trained individually gained in both knowledge and safer behavior. Children trained virtually gained in safer behavior but not knowledge. If VR is used

Pedestrian crossing behavior, an observational study in the city of Ushuaia, Argentina.

PubMed

Poó, Fernando Martín; Ledesma, Ruben Daniel; Trujillo, Roberto

2018-04-03

Pedestrian crashes are a critical problem in Latin American countries. However, little research has been published about pedestrians and even less about their behaviors in a naturalistic context. The objective of the present research was to explore risky pedestrian crossing behaviors in traffic intersections in an argentine city (Ushuaia). It is focused in different stages of the crossing process, traffic code violations, and other potentially risky behaviors such as distractions. A high frequency of risky behaviors among pedestrians was expected. Moreover, according to previous findings, it was hypothesized that men and younger pedestrians would show riskier behaviors. Participants were 802 pedestrians (53.9% females) observed at several intersections (with and without traffic lights) in the city of Ushuaia. Behaviors were codified following a standardized observation protocol. Observers documented information on behavior previous to, during, and after crossing. Gender and age were also registered. Data were gathered through video recording. Frequency analyses of observed behaviors were conducted for the total sample, as well as by gender and by age group. A general crossing risk index was calculated to facilitate comparisons between the genders and age groups. We conducted an analysis of variance to evaluate gender and age differences for this index. A high proportion of risky behaviors were observed among pedestrians. The majority of pedestrian waited in the street (as opposed to on the sidewalk) before crossing, did not comply with traffic lights, or crossed outside the crosswalk. A large number of pedestrians were distracted while crossing. Men presented higher scores on risky behaviors than women. No differences were observed by age group. The high level of risk behaviors during the different stages of street crossing is worrisome and reinforces the idea that pedestrians are responsible for many of the conflicts with motorists. Many of the risky behaviors

Pedestrian safety in Virginia : accident characteristics and suggested revisions to Virginia's pedestrian laws.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1981-01-01

The purpose of the research reported here was to evaluate the nature, characteristics, and severity of accidents involving pedestrians in Virginia and to determine whether or not these data would suggest the need for changes in Virginia traffic laws ...

Model regulations and public education for rural-suburban pedestrian safety

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1980-08-01

The objectives of this study were to review the rural-suburban pedestrian accident data (Knoblauch, 1977) and freeway pedestrian accident data (Knoblauch, Moore and Schmitz, 1976) and determine which accident types were amenable to countermeasures de...

Simulating competitive egress of noncircular pedestrians.

PubMed

Hidalgo, R C; Parisi, D R; Zuriguel, I

2017-04-01

We present a numerical framework to simulate pedestrian dynamics in highly competitive conditions by means of a force-based model implemented with spherocylindrical particles instead of the traditional, symmetric disks. This modification of the individuals' shape allows one to naturally reproduce recent experimental findings of room evacuations through narrow doors in situations where the contact pressure among the pedestrians was rather large. In particular, we obtain a power-law tail distribution of the time lapses between the passage of consecutive individuals. In addition, we show that this improvement leads to new features where the particles' rotation acquires great significance.

Investigating and improving pedestrian safety in an urban environment.

PubMed

Pollack, Keshia M; Gielen, Andrea C; Mohd Ismail, Mohd Nasir; Mitzner, Molly; Wu, Michael; Links, Jonathan M

2014-12-01

Prompted by a series of fatal and nonfatal pedestrian-vehicle collisions, university leadership from one urban institution collaborated with its academic injury research center to investigate traffic-related hazards facing pedestrians. This descriptive epidemiologic study used multiple data collection strategies to determine the burden of pedestrian injury in the target area. Data were collected in 2011 through a review of university crash reports from campus police; a systematic environmental audit and direct observations using a validated instrument and trained raters; and focus groups with faculty, students, and staff. Study findings were synthesized and evidence-informed recommendations were developed and disseminated to university leadership. Crash reports provided some indication of the risks on the streets adjacent to the campus. The environmental audit identified a lack of signage posting the speed limit, faded crosswalks, issues with traffic light and walk sign synchronization, and limited formal pedestrian crossings, which led to jaywalking. Focus groups participants described dangerous locations and times, signal controls and signage, enforcement of traffic laws, use of cell phones and iPods, and awareness of pedestrian safety. Recommendations to improve pedestrian safety were developed in accordance with the three E's of injury prevention (education, enforcement, and engineering), and along with plans for implementation and evaluation, were presented to university leadership. These results underscore the importance of using multiple methods to understand fully the problem, developing pragmatic recommendations that align with the three E's of injury prevention, and collaborating with leadership who have the authority to implement recommended injury countermeasures. These lessons are relevant for the many colleges and universities in urban settings where a majority of travel to offices, classrooms, and surrounding amenities are by foot.

Powered two-wheeler drivers' risk of hitting a pedestrian in towns.

PubMed

Clabaux, Nicolas; Fournier, Jean-Yves; Michel, Jean-Emmanuel

2014-12-01

The risk of collision between pedestrians and powered two-wheelers is poorly understood today. The objective of this research is to determine the risk for powered two-wheeler drivers of hitting and injuring a pedestrian per kilometer driven in towns and to compare this risk with that run by four-wheeled vehicle drivers. Using the bodily injury accidents recorded by the police on nine roads in the city of Marseille in 2011 and a campaign of observations of powered two-wheeler traffic, we estimated the risk per kilometer driven by powered two-wheeler drivers of hitting a pedestrian and compared it with the risk run by four-wheeled vehicle drivers. The results show that the risk for powered two-wheeler drivers of hitting and injuring a pedestrian is significantly higher than the risk run by four-wheeled vehicle drivers. On the nine roads studied, it is on average 3.33 times higher (95% CI: 1.63; 6.78). Taking four more years into account made it possible to consolidate these results and to tighten the confidence interval. There does indeed seem to be problems in the interactions between pedestrians and powered two-wheeler users in urban traffic. These interaction problems lead to a higher risk of hitting and injuring a pedestrian for powered two-wheeler drivers than for four-wheeled vehicle drivers. The analysis of the police reports suggests that part of this increased risk comes from filtering maneuvers by powered two-wheelers. Possible countermeasures deal with the urban street layout. Measures consisting in reducing the width and the number of traffic lanes to a strict minimum and installing medians or pedestrian islands could be an effective way for the prevention of urban accidents between pedestrians and powered two-wheelers. Copyright © 2014 National Safety Council and Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Development of guidelines for pedestrian safety treatments at signalized intersections.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2012-01-01

For intersections with a permissive or protected-permissive left-turn mode, pedestrians cross during the : permissive period. This operation requires the left-turn driver to yield to both opposing vehicles and : pedestrians, prior to accepting a gap ...

Experimental field test of proposed pedestrian safety messages. Volume 3

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1983-11-01

Author's abstract: A detailed re-analysis of available pedestrian accident data was utilized to define three sets of pedestrian safety public information and education (PI&E) Messages. These messages were then produced and field tested. The objective...

Improving safety of vulnerable road users : effectiveness of environment and in-vehicle warning systems at intermodal interchanges.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2014-01-01

In 2009, there were over 114,000 fatalities and injuries in the U.S. among vulnerable road users (VRUs; pedestrians and pedal cyclists; NHTSA, 2010). 4,092 pedestrians were killed in pedestrian-vehicle crashes. Pedestrian risk at intermodal interchan...

Exploring patterns of movement suspension in pedestrian mobility.

PubMed

Orellana, Daniel; Wachowicz, Monica

2011-01-01

One of the main tasks in analyzing pedestrian movement is to detect places where pedestrians stop, as those places usually are associated with specific human activities, and they can allow us to understand pedestrian movement behavior. Very few approaches have been proposed to detect the locations of stops in positioning data sets, and they often are based on selecting the location of candidate stops as well as potential spatial and temporal thresholds according to different application requirements. However, these approaches are not suitable for analyzing the slow movement of pedestrians where the inaccuracy of a nondifferential global positioning system commonly used for movement tracking is so significant that it can hinder the selection of adequate thresholds. In this article, we propose an exploratory statistical approach to detect patterns of movement suspension using a local indicator of spatial association (LISA) in a vector space representation. Two different positioning data sets are used to evaluate our approach in terms of exploring movement suspension patterns that can be related to different landscapes: players of an urban outdoor mobile game and visitors of a natural park. The results of both experiments show that patterns of movement suspension were located at places such as checkpoints in the game and different attractions and facilities in the park. Based on these results, we conclude that using LISA is a reliable approach for exploring movement suspension patterns that represent the places where the movement of pedestrians is temporally suspended by physical restrictions (e.g., checkpoints of a mobile game and the route choosing points of a park).

The risk of pedestrian collisions with peripheral visual field loss.

PubMed

Peli, Eli; Apfelbaum, Henry; Berson, Eliot L; Goldstein, Robert B

2016-12-01

Patients with peripheral field loss complain of colliding with other pedestrians in open-space environments such as shopping malls. Field expansion devices (e.g., prisms) can create artificial peripheral islands of vision. We investigated the visual angle at which these islands can be most effective for avoiding pedestrian collisions, by modeling the collision risk density as a function of bearing angle of pedestrians relative to the patient. Pedestrians at all possible locations were assumed to be moving in all directions with equal probability within a reasonable range of walking speeds. The risk density was found to be highly anisotropic. It peaked at ≈45° eccentricity. Increasing pedestrian speed range shifted the risk to higher eccentricities. The risk density is independent of time to collision. The model results were compared to the binocular residual peripheral island locations of 42 patients with forms of retinitis pigmentosa. The natural residual island prevalence also peaked nasally at about 45° but temporally at about 75°. This asymmetry resulted in a complementary coverage of the binocular field of view. Natural residual binocular island eccentricities seem well matched to the collision-risk density function, optimizing detection of other walking pedestrians (nasally) and of faster hazards (temporally). Field expansion prism devices will be most effective if they can create artificial peripheral islands at about 45° eccentricities. The collision risk and residual island findings raise interesting questions about normal visual development.

Detailed assessment of pedestrian ground contact injuries observed from in-depth accident data.

PubMed

Shang, Shi; Otte, Dietmar; Li, Guibing; Simms, Ciaran

2018-01-01

Most pedestrians struck by vehicles receive injuries from contact with the vehicle and also from the subsequent ground contact. However, ground related pedestrian injuries have received little focus. This paper uses 1221 German pedestrian collision cases occurring between 2000 and 2015 to assess the distribution and risk factors for pedestrian ground related injuries. Results show that for MAIS 2, the ground accounted for 24% of cases, for MAIS 3 the ground accounted for 20% of cases and for MAIS 4-5, the ground accounted for 14% of cases. There were no AIS 6 ground related injuries, though there were several fatal cases where the ground was coded as the most serious injury. The head, thorax and spine dominate AIS 4-5 ground contact injuries. Vehicle impact speeds were higher for ground related AIS 4-5 compared to AIS 2 injury cases and the average impact speed for ground related injuries to the upper and lower extremities was lower than for body regions like head, thorax and spine. There was a significant age effect on pedestrian ground related injury outcome, with older pedestrians suffering more severe injuries and the median age for thorax injuries was higher than for all other body regions. There was no significant difference in the proportions of AIS 2+ head injuries produced by ground contact for more recent vehicles (model year since 2005) compared to older vehicles (model year before 2005). However, logistic regression analysis showed that the normalised bonnet leading-edge height is a risk factor for adult pedestrian AIS2+ ground related head injuries, and this provides empirical support for recent computational modelling predictions which implied a relationship between vehicle shape and pedestrian ground contact injuries. Considering the potential benefits of preventing pedestrian ground contact, for collisions below 40km/h two thirds of the injury costs would be eliminated if ground contact could be prevented, and even higher benefits are likely at

Differences in geometry of pedestrian crashes in daylight and darkness.

PubMed

Sullivan, John M; Flannagan, Michael J

2011-02-01

Previous studies have shown that increased risk in darkness is particularly great for pedestrian crashes, suggesting that attempts to improve headlighting should focus on factors that likely influence those crashes. The current analysis was designed to provide information about how details of pedestrian crashes may differ between daylight and darkness. All pedestrian crashes that occurred in daylight or dark conditions in Michigan during 2004 were analyzed in terms of the variables included in the State of Michigan crash database. Additional analysis of the narratives and diagrams in police accident reports was performed for a subset of 400 of those crashes-200 sampled from daylight and 200 sampled from darkness. Several differences were found that appear to be related to the characteristic asymmetry of low-beam headlamps, which (in the United States) distributes more light on the passenger's side than the driver's side of the vehicle. These results provide preliminary quantification of the how the photometric differences between the right and left sides of typical headlamps may affect pedestrian crash risk. The results suggest that efforts to provide supplemental forward vehicle lighting in turns may have safety benefits for pedestrians. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Composite accidental axions

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Redi, Michele; Sato, Ryosuke

2016-05-01

We present several models where the QCD axion arises accidentally. Confining gauge theories can generate axion candidates whose properties are uniquely determined by the quantum numbers of the new fermions under the Standard Model. The Peccei-Quinn symmetry can emerge accidentally if the gauge theory is chiral. We generalise previous constructions in a unified framework. In some cases these models can be understood as the deconstruction of 5-dimensional gauge theories where the Peccei-Quinn symmetry is protected by locality but more general constructions are possible.

The roles of gender, age and cognitive development in children's pedestrian route selection.

PubMed

Barton, B K; Ulrich, T; Lyday, B

2012-03-01

Thousands of American children under the age of 10 years are injured annually as pedestrians. Despite the scope of this public health problem, knowledge about behavioural control and developmental factors involved in the aetiology of child pedestrian safety is limited. The present study examined the roles of gender, age and two aspects of cognitive development (visual search and efficiency of processing) in children's safe pedestrian route selection. Measures of cognitive functioning (visual search and efficiency) and selections of risky pedestrian routes were collected from 65 children aged 5-9 years. Boys, younger children and those with less developed cognitive functioning selected riskier pedestrian routes. Cognitive functioning also subsumed age as a predictor of risky route selections. Our findings suggest developmental differences, specifically less developed cognitive functioning, play important roles in children's pedestrian decision making. Directions for future examination are discussed. © 2011 Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

Child pedestrian safety knowledge, behaviour and road injury in Cape Town, South Africa.

PubMed

Koekemoer, Karin; Van Gesselleen, Megan; Van Niekerk, Ashley; Govender, Rajen; Van As, Arjan Bastiaan

2017-02-01

Pedestrian injuries are a leading cause of death among South African children, and young children residing in low-income communities are more at risk, due to various factors such as inadequate road infrastructure, exposure to traffic due to reliance on walking as a means of transport, and lack of supervision. This study used a cross-sectional, non-randomized self-report survey to assess pedestrian safety knowledge, road-crossing behaviour and pedestrian injuries of primary school children in selected low-income settings in Cape Town. The survey focused on three primary schools that had joined the Safe Kids Worldwide Model School Zone Project and was administered to 536 children aged 6-15 years, in their home language of isiXhosa. Descriptive and bivariate analyses as well as multivariate regression analyses were conducted to investigate potential predictor variables for pedestrian collision severity and unsafe road-crossing behaviour. Walking was the sole form of travel for 81% of the children, with a large proportion regularly walking unsupervised. Children who walk to or from school alone were younger and reported riskier road-crossing behaviour, although children who walk accompanied tended to have higher pedestrian collision severity. "Negligent Behaviour" related to road-crossing was significantly associated with higher pedestrian collision severity, with predictors of "Negligent Behaviour" including the lack of pedestrian safety knowledge and greater exposure to traffic in terms of time spent walking. More than half of the reported pedestrian collisions involved a bicycle, and older boys (10-15 years) were most at risk of experiencing a severe pedestrian injury. The findings substantiate emerging evidence that children in low-income settings are at greater risk for child pedestrian injury, and emphasise the need for evidence-based safety promotion and injury prevention interventions in these settings. Copyright © 2016. Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Research of the relationship of pedestrian injury to collision speed, car-type, impact location and pedestrian sizes using human FE model (THUMS Version 4).

PubMed

Watanabe, Ryosuke; Katsuhara, Tadasuke; Miyazaki, Hiroshi; Kitagawa, Yuichi; Yasuki, Tsuyoshi

2012-10-01

Injuries in car to pedestrian collisions are affected by various factors such as the vehicle body type, pedestrian body size and impact location as well as the collision speed. This study aimed to investigate the influence of such factors taking a Finite Element (FE) approach. A total of 72 collision cases were simulated using three different vehicle FE models (Sedan, SUV, Mini-Van), three different pedestrian FE models (AM50, AF05, AM95), assuming two different impact locations (center and the corner of the bumper) and at four different collision speeds (20, 30, 40 and 50 km/h). The impact kinematics and the responses of the pedestrian model were validated against those in the literature prior to the simulations. The relationship between the collision speed and the predicted occurrence of head and chest injuries was examined for each case, analyzing the impact kinematics of the pedestrian against the vehicle body and resultant loading to the head and the chest. Strain based indicators were used in the simulation model to estimate skeletal injury (bony fracture) and soft tissue (brain and internal organs) injury. The study results primarily showed that the injury risk became higher with the collision speed, but was also affected by the combination of the factors such as the pedestrian size and the impact location. The study also discussed the injury patterns and trends with respect to the factors examined. In all of the simulated conditions, the model did not predict any severe injury at a collision speed of 20 km/h.

Driving With Hemianopia: III. Detection of Stationary and Approaching Pedestrians in a Simulator

PubMed Central

Alberti, Concetta F.; Peli, Eli; Bowers, Alex R.

2014-01-01

Purpose. To compare blind-side detection performance of drivers with homonymous hemianopia (HH) for stationary and approaching pedestrians, initially appearing at small (4°) or large (14°) eccentricities in a driving simulator. While the stationary pedestrians did not represent an imminent threat, as their eccentricity increased rapidly as the vehicle advanced, the approaching pedestrians maintained a collision course with approximately constant eccentricity, walking or running, toward the travel lane as if to cross. Methods. Twelve participants with complete HH and without spatial neglect pressed the horn whenever they detected a pedestrian while driving along predetermined routes in two driving simulator sessions. Miss rates and reaction times were analyzed for 52 stationary and 52 approaching pedestrians. Results. Miss rates were higher and reaction times longer on the blind than the seeing side (P < 0.01). On the blind side, miss rates were lower for approaching than stationary pedestrians (16% vs. 29%, P = 0.01), especially at larger eccentricities (20% vs. 54%, P = 0.005), but reaction times for approaching pedestrians were longer (1.72 vs. 1.41 seconds; P = 0.03). Overall, the proportion of potential blind-side collisions (missed and late responses) was not different for the two paradigms (41% vs. 35%, P = 0.48), and significantly higher than for the seeing side (3%, P = 0.002). Conclusions. In a realistic pedestrian detection task, drivers with HH exhibited significant blind-side detection deficits. Even when approaching pedestrians were detected, responses were often too late to avoid a potential collision. PMID:24346175

Epidemiology of accidental radiation exposures.

PubMed Central

Cardis, E

1996-01-01

Much of the information on the health effects of radiation exposure available to date comes from long-term studies of the atomic bombings in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Accidental exposures, such as those resulting from the Chernobyl and Kyshtym accidents, have as yet provided little information concerning health effects of ionizing radiation. This paper will present the current state of our knowledge concerning radiation effects, review major large-scale accidental radiation exposures, and discuss information that could be obtained from studies of accidental exposures and the types of studies that are needed. PMID:8781398

7 CFR 501.11 - Mobile equipment and pedestrian traffic.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-01-01

... 7 Agriculture 6 2010-01-01 2010-01-01 false Mobile equipment and pedestrian traffic. 501.11... § 501.11 Mobile equipment and pedestrian traffic. (a) Drivers, operators, or pilots of all equipment... activity, shall operate in a careful and safe manner at all times and shall comply with the signals and...

Nighttime Foreground Pedestrian Detection Based on Three-Dimensional Voxel Surface Model.

PubMed

Li, Jing; Zhang, Fangbing; Wei, Lisong; Yang, Tao; Lu, Zhaoyang

2017-10-16

Pedestrian detection is among the most frequently-used preprocessing tasks in many surveillance application fields, from low-level people counting to high-level scene understanding. Even though many approaches perform well in the daytime with sufficient illumination, pedestrian detection at night is still a critical and challenging problem for video surveillance systems. To respond to this need, in this paper, we provide an affordable solution with a near-infrared stereo network camera, as well as a novel three-dimensional foreground pedestrian detection model. Specifically, instead of using an expensive thermal camera, we build a near-infrared stereo vision system with two calibrated network cameras and near-infrared lamps. The core of the system is a novel voxel surface model, which is able to estimate the dynamic changes of three-dimensional geometric information of the surveillance scene and to segment and locate foreground pedestrians in real time. A free update policy for unknown points is designed for model updating, and the extracted shadow of the pedestrian is adopted to remove foreground false alarms. To evaluate the performance of the proposed model, the system is deployed in several nighttime surveillance scenes. Experimental results demonstrate that our method is capable of nighttime pedestrian segmentation and detection in real time under heavy occlusion. In addition, the qualitative and quantitative comparison results show that our work outperforms classical background subtraction approaches and a recent RGB-D method, as well as achieving comparable performance with the state-of-the-art deep learning pedestrian detection method even with a much lower hardware cost.

Nighttime Foreground Pedestrian Detection Based on Three-Dimensional Voxel Surface Model

PubMed Central

Li, Jing; Zhang, Fangbing; Wei, Lisong; Lu, Zhaoyang

2017-01-01

Pedestrian detection is among the most frequently-used preprocessing tasks in many surveillance application fields, from low-level people counting to high-level scene understanding. Even though many approaches perform well in the daytime with sufficient illumination, pedestrian detection at night is still a critical and challenging problem for video surveillance systems. To respond to this need, in this paper, we provide an affordable solution with a near-infrared stereo network camera, as well as a novel three-dimensional foreground pedestrian detection model. Specifically, instead of using an expensive thermal camera, we build a near-infrared stereo vision system with two calibrated network cameras and near-infrared lamps. The core of the system is a novel voxel surface model, which is able to estimate the dynamic changes of three-dimensional geometric information of the surveillance scene and to segment and locate foreground pedestrians in real time. A free update policy for unknown points is designed for model updating, and the extracted shadow of the pedestrian is adopted to remove foreground false alarms. To evaluate the performance of the proposed model, the system is deployed in several nighttime surveillance scenes. Experimental results demonstrate that our method is capable of nighttime pedestrian segmentation and detection in real time under heavy occlusion. In addition, the qualitative and quantitative comparison results show that our work outperforms classical background subtraction approaches and a recent RGB-D method, as well as achieving comparable performance with the state-of-the-art deep learning pedestrian detection method even with a much lower hardware cost. PMID:29035295

Best practices for addressing pedestrian crashes on high-speed roadways.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2015-10-01

Texas ranks as the worst state in the nation for interstate pedestrian fatalities. Almost 600 pedestrians died on : interstate roadways during the 5-year period between 2007 and 2011. Texas is the fourth-highest state in terms of : interstate pedestr...

Using connected vehicle technology to deliver timely warnings to pedestrians.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2016-07-01

Pedestrian injuries and deaths caused by collisions with motor vehicles are on the : rise in the U.S. One factor that may increase the risk of such collisions is pedestrian : mobile device use. Both field observations and controlled experiments indic...

Children at risk: A comparison of child pedestrian traffic collisions in Santiago, Chile, and Seoul, South Korea.

PubMed

Blazquez, Carola; Lee, Jae Seung; Zegras, Christopher

2016-01-01

We examine and compare pedestrian-vehicle collisions and injury outcomes involving school-age children between 5 and 18 years of age in the capital cities of Santiago, Chile, and Seoul, South Korea. We conduct descriptive analysis of the child pedestrian-vehicle collision (P-VC) data (904 collisions for Santiago and 3,505 for Seoul) reported by the police between 2010 and 2011. We also statistically analyze factors associated with child P-VCs, by both incident severity and age group, using 3 regression models: negative binomial, probit, and spatial lag models. Descriptive statistics suggest that child pedestrians in Seoul have a higher risk of being involved in traffic crashes than their counterparts in Santiago. However, in Seoul a greater proportion of children are unharmed as a result of these incidents, whereas more child pedestrians are killed in Santiago. Younger children in Seoul suffer more injuries from P-VCs than in Santiago. The majority of P-VCs in both cities tend to occur in the afternoon and evening, at intersections in Santiago and at midblock locations in Seoul. Our model results suggest that the resident population of children is positively associated with P-VCs in both cities, and school concentrations apparently increase P-VC risk among older children in Santiago. Bus stops are associated with higher P-VCs in Seoul, and subway stations relate to higher P-VCs among older children in Santiago. Zone-level land use mix was negatively related to child P-VCs in Seoul but not in Santiago. Arterial roads are associated with fewer P-VCs, especially for younger children in both cities. A share of collector roads is associated with increased P-VCs in Seoul but fewer P-VCs in Santiago. Hilliness is related to fewer P-VCs in both cities. Differences in these model results for Santiago and Seoul warrant additional analysis, as do the differences in results across model type (negative binomial versus spatial lag models). To reduce child P-VCs, this study

5 CFR 870.206 - Accidental death and dismemberment.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-01-01

... 5 Administrative Personnel 2 2010-01-01 2010-01-01 false Accidental death and dismemberment. 870....206 Accidental death and dismemberment. (a) (1) Accidental death and dismemberment coverage is an automatic part of Basic and Option A insurance for employees. (2) There is no accidental death and...

5 CFR 870.206 - Accidental death and dismemberment.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-01-01

... 5 Administrative Personnel 2 2014-01-01 2014-01-01 false Accidental death and dismemberment. 870....206 Accidental death and dismemberment. (a)(1) Accidental death and dismemberment coverage is an automatic part of Basic and Option A insurance for employees. (2) There is no accidental death and...

5 CFR 870.206 - Accidental death and dismemberment.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-01-01

... 5 Administrative Personnel 2 2011-01-01 2011-01-01 false Accidental death and dismemberment. 870....206 Accidental death and dismemberment. (a)(1) Accidental death and dismemberment coverage is an automatic part of Basic and Option A insurance for employees. (2) There is no accidental death and...

5 CFR 870.206 - Accidental death and dismemberment.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-01-01

... 5 Administrative Personnel 2 2013-01-01 2013-01-01 false Accidental death and dismemberment. 870....206 Accidental death and dismemberment. (a)(1) Accidental death and dismemberment coverage is an automatic part of Basic and Option A insurance for employees. (2) There is no accidental death and...

5 CFR 870.206 - Accidental death and dismemberment.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-01-01

... 5 Administrative Personnel 2 2012-01-01 2012-01-01 false Accidental death and dismemberment. 870....206 Accidental death and dismemberment. (a)(1) Accidental death and dismemberment coverage is an automatic part of Basic and Option A insurance for employees. (2) There is no accidental death and...

Child pedestrian injury and fatality in a developing country.

PubMed

Solagberu, Babatunde Akibu; Osuoji, Roland I; Ibrahim, Nasiru Akanmu; Oludara, Mobolaji A; Balogun, Rufai A; Ajani, Abdulwahab Olanrewaju; Idowu, Olufemi Emmanuel; Mustafa, Ibrahim A; Sanni, Felix O

2014-06-01

Child pedestrian injuries and fatalities in developing countries continue to increase. We examined child pedestrian injuries and fatalities in the most populated urban agglomeration in Africa in order to develop control measures. Two-year prospective study of injured child pedestrians (≤15 years) at the Surgical Emergency Room (SER) to determine demography, vehicles involved, road location, injury mechanism, pre-hospital transport, injury-arrival time, regions injured, injury severity and fatalities was done. Some 226 pedestrians (114 boys and 112 girls) comprising 42 children aged ≤4 years, 91 aged 5-9 years and 93 aged 10-15 years were seen with car collisions (83 pedestrians, 36.7%), motorcycles (76, 33.6%), buses (41, 18.1%), others (15, 6.6%) and 11 undetermined vehicles. Injuries on the highways were 147 (65%); inner-city roads 77 (34.1%) and two undetermined roads. Crossing the road was responsible for 168 (74.3%) pedestrian injuries; while three other mechanisms produced 58 (25.7%) patients. Regions injured were head (42.9%), lower limbs (35.4%) and others (21.7%). Relatives, bystanders and police/ambulance brought 186 (82.3%), 31 (13.7%) and eight (3.5%) children, respectively; and within 6 h (43.4, 11.5 and 2.2%) and after (38.9, 2.2 and 1.3%). Nineteen deaths (10 brought-in-dead, nine SER deaths) occurred; 15 of them girls, 15 had severe head injury, 15 were brought by relatives. However, fatality risks were truck collisions (OR 5.97), female child (OR 4.25), head injury (OR 4.18) and age ≤4 years (OR 3.7). The equal sex incidence, worse female fatality despite similar exposure and injury severity with male, deserve further research. Improved pre-hospital and SER care is needed.

Pedestrian and traffic safety in parking lots at SNL/NM : audit background report.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Sanchez, Paul Ernest

2009-03-01

This report supplements audit 2008-E-0009, conducted by the ES&H, Quality, Safeguards & Security Audits Department, 12870, during fall and winter of FY 2008. The study evaluates slips, trips and falls, the leading cause of reportable injuries at Sandia. In 2007, almost half of over 100 of such incidents occurred in parking lots. During the course of the audit, over 5000 observations were collected in 10 parking lots across SNL/NM. Based on benchmarks and trends of pedestrian behavior, the report proposes pedestrian-friendly features and attributes to improve pedestrian safety in parking lots. Less safe pedestrian behavior is associated with older parkingmore » lots lacking pedestrian-friendly features and attributes, like those for buildings 823, 887 and 811. Conversely, safer pedestrian behavior is associated with newer parking lots that have designated walkways, intra-lot walkways and sidewalks. Observations also revealed that motorists are in widespread noncompliance with parking lot speed limits and stop signs and markers.« less

Trespassing on the tracks: a review of railway pedestrian safety research.

PubMed

Lobb, Brenda

2006-01-01

Train-pedestrian collisions have been shown to be the leading cause of fatality in train-related accidents worldwide, yet there is remarkably little research in this area. In this paper, the major types of railway transportation accident research are briefly highlighted to indicate the general context of research concerning train-pedestrian collisions, which are then reviewed. Themes emerging from the diverse research are identified, the various strategies that have been proposed for prevention of railway pedestrian accidents are discussed, and the empirical evidence for their efficacy examined in the light of the much more extensive literature on road pedestrian accidents. Finally, it is proposed that application of current theory in behavioral and cognitive psychology may usefully inform future research in transportation safety.

Directional guidance from audible pedestrian signals for street crossing.

PubMed

Wall, Robert S; Ashmead, Daniel H; Bentzen, Billie Louise; Barlow, Janet

2004-10-10

Typical audible pedestrian signals indicate when the pedestrian walk interval is in effect but provide little, or even misleading information for directional alignment. In three experiments, blind and blindfolded sighted adults crossed a simulated crossing with recorded traffic noise to approximate street sounds. This was done to investigate how characteristics of signal presentation affected usefulness of the auditory signal for guiding crossing behaviour. Crossing was more accurate when signals came only from the far end of the crossing rather than the typical practice of presenting signals simultaneously from both ends. Alternating the signal between ends of the crossing was not helpful. Also, the customary practice of signalling two parallel crossings at the same time drew participants somewhat toward the opposite crossing. Providing a locator tone at the end of the crossing during the pedestrian clearance interval improved crossing accuracy. These findings provide a basis for designing audible pedestrian signals to enhance directional guidance. The principal findings were the same for blind and sighted participants and applied across a range of specific signals (e.g. chirps, clicks, voices).

Selfishness- and Selflessness-based models of pedestrian room evacuation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Song, Xiao; Ma, Liang; Ma, Yaofei; Yang, Chen; Ji, Hang

2016-04-01

Some pedestrian evacuation studies have employed game strategy to deal with moving conflicts involving two or three pedestrians. However, most of these have simply presented game strategies for pedestrians without analyzing the reasons why they choose to defect or cooperate. We believe that selfish and selfless behaviors are two main factors that should be considered in evacuation. In addition to these behaviors, human emotions such as sympathy and behaviors such as vying were also taken into account to investigate their impacts on pedestrians' strategies. Moreover, an essential objective factor, the building design factor of door width was tested and analyzed. Experimental results showed that the sense of self leads to more defectors and a longer evacuation time. However, sympathy does some good, leading to more cooperators and a shorter evacuation time. Moreover, the exit door width is an essential factor of the evacuation efficiency. When the width was less than 6 cells in a rectangular room with a size greater than 50 × 50, the evacuation time greatly decreased when the width increased. However, this effect was less obvious when the width increased.

Impact of Transit Stop Location on Pedestrian Safety [Final Report

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2017-10-30

This research involved a GIS analysis of pedestrian crashes that occurred within 100 feet of bus stops in Broward County and Palm Beach County, Florida between 2011 and 2014. There were 357 such pedestrian crashes in Broward County and 221 in Palm Be...

Laser-based pedestrian tracking in outdoor environments by multiple mobile robots.

PubMed

Ozaki, Masataka; Kakimuma, Kei; Hashimoto, Masafumi; Takahashi, Kazuhiko

2012-10-29

This paper presents an outdoors laser-based pedestrian tracking system using a group of mobile robots located near each other. Each robot detects pedestrians from its own laser scan image using an occupancy-grid-based method, and the robot tracks the detected pedestrians via Kalman filtering and global-nearest-neighbor (GNN)-based data association. The tracking data is broadcast to multiple robots through intercommunication and is combined using the covariance intersection (CI) method. For pedestrian tracking, each robot identifies its own posture using real-time-kinematic GPS (RTK-GPS) and laser scan matching. Using our cooperative tracking method, all the robots share the tracking data with each other; hence, individual robots can always recognize pedestrians that are invisible to any other robot. The simulation and experimental results show that cooperating tracking provides the tracking performance better than conventional individual tracking does. Our tracking system functions in a decentralized manner without any central server, and therefore, this provides a degree of scalability and robustness that cannot be achieved by conventional centralized architectures.

Laser-Based Pedestrian Tracking in Outdoor Environments by Multiple Mobile Robots

PubMed Central

Ozaki, Masataka; Kakimuma, Kei; Hashimoto, Masafumi; Takahashi, Kazuhiko

2012-01-01

This paper presents an outdoors laser-based pedestrian tracking system using a group of mobile robots located near each other. Each robot detects pedestrians from its own laser scan image using an occupancy-grid-based method, and the robot tracks the detected pedestrians via Kalman filtering and global-nearest-neighbor (GNN)-based data association. The tracking data is broadcast to multiple robots through intercommunication and is combined using the covariance intersection (CI) method. For pedestrian tracking, each robot identifies its own posture using real-time-kinematic GPS (RTK-GPS) and laser scan matching. Using our cooperative tracking method, all the robots share the tracking data with each other; hence, individual robots can always recognize pedestrians that are invisible to any other robot. The simulation and experimental results show that cooperating tracking provides the tracking performance better than conventional individual tracking does. Our tracking system functions in a decentralized manner without any central server, and therefore, this provides a degree of scalability and robustness that cannot be achieved by conventional centralized architectures. PMID:23202171

Injury pattern in lethal motorbikes-pedestrian collisions, in the area of Barcelona, Spain.

PubMed

Rebollo-Soria, M Carmen; Arregui-Dalmases, Carlos; Sánchez-Molina, David; Velázquez-Ameijide, Juan; Galtés, Ignasi

2016-10-01

There are several studies about M1 type vehicle-pedestrian collision injury pattern, and based on them, there has been several changes in automobiles for pedestrian protection. However, the lack of sufficient studies about injury pattern in motorbikes-pedestrian collisions leads to a lack of optimization design of these vehicles. The objective of this research is to study the injury pattern of pedestrians involved in collisions with motorized two-wheeled vehicles. A retrospective descriptive study of pedestrian's deaths after collisions with motorcycles in an urban area, like Barcelona was performed. The cases were collected from the Forensic Pathology Service database of the Institute of Legal Medicine of Catalonia. The selected cases were categorized as pedestrian-motorcycle collision, between January 1st, 2005 and December 31st, 2014. Data were collected from the autopsy, medical, and police report. The collected information was then analyzed using Microsoft Excel statistical functions. Traumatic Brain Injury is the main cause of death in pedestrian hit by motorized two-wheeled vehicles (62.85%). The most frequent injury was the subarachnoid hemorrhage, in 71.4% of cases, followed by cerebral contusions and skull base fractures (65.7%). By contrast, pelvic fractures and tibia fractures only appeared in 28.6%. The study characterizes the injury pattern of pedestrians involved in a collision with motorized two-wheeled vehicles in an urban area, like Barcelona, which has been found to be different from other vehicle-pedestrian collisions, with a higher incidence of brain injuries and minor frequency of lower extremities fractures in pelvis, tibia and fibula. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ltd and Faculty of Forensic and Legal Medicine. All rights reserved.

Validity of instruments to assess students' travel and pedestrian safety.

PubMed

Mendoza, Jason A; Watson, Kathy; Baranowski, Tom; Nicklas, Theresa A; Uscanga, Doris K; Hanfling, Marcus J

2010-05-18

Safe Routes to School (SRTS) programs are designed to make walking and bicycling to school safe and accessible for children. Despite their growing popularity, few validated measures exist for assessing important outcomes such as type of student transport or pedestrian safety behaviors. This research validated the SRTS school travel survey and a pedestrian safety behavior checklist. Fourth grade students completed a brief written survey on how they got to school that day with set responses. Test-retest reliability was obtained 3-4 hours apart. Convergent validity of the SRTS travel survey was assessed by comparison to parents' report. For the measure of pedestrian safety behavior, 10 research assistants observed 29 students at a school intersection for completion of 8 selected pedestrian safety behaviors. Reliability was determined in two ways: correlations between the research assistants' ratings to that of the Principal Investigator (PI) and intraclass correlations (ICC) across research assistant ratings. The SRTS travel survey had high test-retest reliability (kappa = 0.97, n = 96, p < 0.001) and convergent validity (kappa = 0.87, n = 81, p < 0.001). The pedestrian safety behavior checklist had moderate reliability across research assistants' ratings (ICC = 0.48) and moderate correlation with the PI (r = 0.55, p = < 0.01). When two raters simultaneously used the instrument, the ICC increased to 0.65. Overall percent agreement (91%), sensitivity (85%) and specificity (83%) were acceptable. These validated instruments can be used to assess SRTS programs. The pedestrian safety behavior checklist may benefit from further formative work.

Validity of instruments to assess students' travel and pedestrian safety

PubMed Central

2010-01-01

Background Safe Routes to School (SRTS) programs are designed to make walking and bicycling to school safe and accessible for children. Despite their growing popularity, few validated measures exist for assessing important outcomes such as type of student transport or pedestrian safety behaviors. This research validated the SRTS school travel survey and a pedestrian safety behavior checklist. Methods Fourth grade students completed a brief written survey on how they got to school that day with set responses. Test-retest reliability was obtained 3-4 hours apart. Convergent validity of the SRTS travel survey was assessed by comparison to parents' report. For the measure of pedestrian safety behavior, 10 research assistants observed 29 students at a school intersection for completion of 8 selected pedestrian safety behaviors. Reliability was determined in two ways: correlations between the research assistants' ratings to that of the Principal Investigator (PI) and intraclass correlations (ICC) across research assistant ratings. Results The SRTS travel survey had high test-retest reliability (κ = 0.97, n = 96, p < 0.001) and convergent validity (κ = 0.87, n = 81, p < 0.001). The pedestrian safety behavior checklist had moderate reliability across research assistants' ratings (ICC = 0.48) and moderate correlation with the PI (r = 0.55, p =< 0.01). When two raters simultaneously used the instrument, the ICC increased to 0.65. Overall percent agreement (91%), sensitivity (85%) and specificity (83%) were acceptable. Conclusions These validated instruments can be used to assess SRTS programs. The pedestrian safety behavior checklist may benefit from further formative work. PMID:20482778

Effect of cell phone distraction on pediatric pedestrian injury risk.

PubMed

Stavrinos, Despina; Byington, Katherine W; Schwebel, David C

2009-02-01

Early adolescents are using cell phones with increasing frequency. Cell phones are known to distract motor vehicle drivers to the point that their safety is jeopardized, but it is unclear if cell phones might also distract child pedestrians. This study was designed to examine the influence of talking on a cell phone for pediatric pedestrian injury risk. Seventy-seven children aged 10 to 11 years old completed simulated road crossings in an immersive, interactive virtual pedestrian environment. In a within-subjects design, children crossed the virtual street 6 times while undistracted and 6 times while distracted by a cell phone conversation with an unfamiliar research assistant. Participants also completed several other experimental tasks hypothesized to predict the impact of distraction while crossing the street and talking on a cell phone. Children's pedestrian safety was compromised when distracted by a cell phone conversation. While distracted, children were less attentive to traffic; left less safe time between their crossing and the next arriving vehicle; experienced more collisions and close calls with oncoming traffic; and waited longer before beginning to cross the street. Analyses testing experience using a cell phone and experience as a pedestrian yielded few significant results, suggesting that distraction on the cell phone might affect children's pedestrian safety no matter what their experience level. There was some indication that younger children and children who are less attentive and more oppositional may be slightly more susceptible to distraction while talking on the cell phone than older, more attentive, and less oppositional children. Our results suggest that cell phones distract preadolescent children while crossing streets.

Kinetic theory of situated agents applied to pedestrian flow in a corridor

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rangel-Huerta, A.; Muñoz-Meléndez, A.

2010-03-01

A situated agent-based model for simulation of pedestrian flow in a corridor is presented. In this model, pedestrians choose their paths freely and make decisions based on local criteria for solving collision conflicts. The crowd consists of multiple walking agents equipped with a function of perception as well as a competitive rule-based strategy that enables pedestrians to reach free access areas. Pedestrians in our model are autonomous entities capable of perceiving and making decisions. They apply socially accepted conventions, such as avoidance rules, as well as individual preferences such as the use of specific exit points, or the execution of eventual comfort turns resulting in spontaneous changes of walking speed. Periodic boundary conditions were considered in order to determine the density-average walking speed, and the density-average activity with respect to specific parameters: comfort angle turn and frequency of angle turn of walking agents. The main contribution of this work is an agent-based model where each pedestrian is represented as an autonomous agent. At the same time the pedestrian crowd dynamics is framed by the kinetic theory of biological systems.

Hazard perception test for pedestrians.

PubMed

Rosenbloom, Tova; Mandel, Roi; Rosner, Yotam; Eldror, Ehud

2015-06-01

This research was aimed to construct and develop a unique system for training of pedestrians - children, adults and older persons - to cross streets safely and especially to detect successfully on-road hazards as pedestrians. For this purpose, an interactive computerized program has been inspired by the format of the popular HPT (hazard perception test) for drivers. The HPTP (hazard perception test for pedestrians) includes 10 pairs of video clips that were filmed in various locations but had a similar hazardous element. The clips presented potentially dangerous crossing scenarios such as a vehicle merging from the right side of the road from the perspective of the pedestrian who is trying to cross the street. The participants were asked to press the spacebar key every time they identified an approaching hazard. The participants were instructed to use the arrow keys for moving the viewing panel to the left or to the right in order to enlarge the field of view accordingly. Totally, 359 participants took part. Adults, children, and elders were assigned to two practice groups and three control groups in a 3 (age groups)×5 (experimental groups) design. One practice group underwent pretest, practice, discussion and posttest, the second experimental group through pretest, practice and posttest, one control group that underwent posttest only, the second control group underwent pretest, discussion and posttest and the third control group underwent both pretest and posttest. The most important finding was that children and adults who underwent practice received higher scores in the posttest compared to the pretest. Also, children who underwent practice increased their use of the arrow keys in the posttest compared to the pretest. Across conditions men scored higher than women on the HPTP, and used the keys more often. Age differences were found, with adults scoring being the highest, followed by children and the older persons. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights

High visibility safety apparel and nighttime conspicuity of pedestrians in work zones.

PubMed

Sayer, James R; Mefford, Mary Lynn

2004-01-01

Every year numerous occupational fatalities result from pedestrians being struck by motor vehicles intruding into work zones. Attributes of retroreflective personal safety garments on pedestrian conspicuity at night were assessed in a field study. Using instrumented vehicles on a closed track, participants drove through simulated work zones attempting to detect pedestrians located in the work zones. Configuration of the retroreflective trim, trim color, placement in the work zone, and driver age significantly affected pedestrian conspicuity. Intensity and the amount of retroreflective trim did not. Personal safety garments incorporating retroreflective trim significantly improve pedestrian conspicuity in work zones. The results emphasize the importance of retroreflective trim on personal safety garments, particularly if the trim is located on garment sleeves. We examine the design attributes that contribute to making a personal safety garment conspicuous. The results have implications regarding preferred garment designs, industry standards, and service life of personal safety garments.

Simultaneous Detection and Tracking of Pedestrian from Panoramic Laser Scanning Data

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Xiao, Wen; Vallet, Bruno; Schindler, Konrad; Paparoditis, Nicolas

2016-06-01

Pedestrian traffic flow estimation is essential for public place design and construction planning. Traditional data collection by human investigation is tedious, inefficient and expensive. Panoramic laser scanners, e.g. Velodyne HDL-64E, which scan surroundings repetitively at a high frequency, have been increasingly used for 3D object tracking. In this paper, a simultaneous detection and tracking (SDAT) method is proposed for precise and automatic pedestrian trajectory recovery. First, the dynamic environment is detected using two different methods, Nearest-point and Max-distance. Then, all the points on moving objects are transferred into a space-time (x, y, t) coordinate system. The pedestrian detection and tracking amounts to assign the points belonging to pedestrians into continuous trajectories in space-time. We formulate the point assignment task as an energy function which incorporates the point evidence, trajectory number, pedestrian shape and motion. A low energy trajectory will well explain the point observations, and have plausible trajectory trend and length. The method inherently filters out points from other moving objects and false detections. The energy function is solved by a two-step optimization process: tracklet detection in a short temporal window; and global tracklet association through the whole time span. Results demonstrate that the proposed method can automatically recover the pedestrians trajectories with accurate positions and low false detections and mismatches.

Crash-type manual for pedestrians

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1996-01-01

Bicyclists or pedestrians are involved in approximately one out of six highway fatalities each year. This research was conducted in order to better understand the precipitating actions, predisposing factors and characteristic populations involved. So...

Pedestrian Choice Behavior at Shopping Mall Intersections in China and the United States

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Bitgood, Stephen; Davey, Gareth; Huang, Xiaoyi; Fung, Holly

2013-01-01

Pedestrian navigation through public spaces reflects the nature of interaction between behavior and environment. This study compared pedestrian choice behavior at shopping mall intersections in China and the United States. The study found that in both countries (a) pedestrians chose movement patterns that involved the fewest steps and (b) there…

The influence of pedestrian countdown signals on children's crossing behavior at school intersections.

PubMed

Fu, Lianning; Zou, Nan

2016-09-01

Previous studies have shown that pedestrian countdown signals had different influences on pedestrian crossing behavior. The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of the installation of countdown signals at school intersections on children's crossing behavior. A comparison analysis was carried out on the basis of observations at two different school intersections with or without pedestrian countdown signals in the city of Jinan, China. Four types of children's crossing behavior and child pedestrian-vehicle conflicts were analyzed in detail. The analysis results showed that using pedestrian countdown timers during the Red Man phase led to more children's violation and running behavior. Theses violators created more conflicts with vehicles. However, pedestrian countdown signals were effective at helping child pedestrian to complete crossing before the red light onset, avoid getting caught in the middle of crosswalk. No significant difference was found in children who started crossing during Flashing Green Man phase between the two types of pedestrian signals. Moreover, analysis results indicated that children who crossed the road alone had more violation and adventure crossing behavior than those had companions. Boys were found more likely to run crossing than girls, but there was no significant gender difference in other crossing behavior. Finally, it's recommended to remove countdown at the end of the Red Man phase to improve children's crossing behavior and reduce the conflicts with vehicles. Meanwhile other measures are proposed to improve children safety at school intersections. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Detection of the toughest: Pedestrian injury risk as a smooth function of age.

PubMed

Niebuhr, Tobias; Junge, Mirko

2017-07-04

Though it is common to refer to age-specific groups (e.g., children, adults, elderly), smooth trends conditional on age are mainly ignored in the literature. The present study examines the pedestrian injury risk in full-frontal pedestrian-to-passenger car accidents and incorporates age-in addition to collision speed and injury severity-as a plug-in parameter. Recent work introduced a model for pedestrian injury risk functions using explicit formulae with easily interpretable model parameters. This model is expanded by pedestrian age as another model parameter. Using the German In-Depth Accident Study (GIDAS) to obtain age-specific risk proportions, the model parameters are fitted to the raw data and then smoothed by broken-line regression. The approach supplies explicit probabilities for pedestrian injury risk conditional on pedestrian age, collision speed, and injury severity under investigation. All results yield consistency to each other in the sense that risks for more severe injuries are less probable than those for less severe injuries. As a side product, the approach indicates specific ages at which the risk behavior fundamentally changes. These threshold values can be interpreted as the most robust ages for pedestrians. The obtained age-wise risk functions can be aggregated and adapted to any population. The presented approach is formulated in such general terms that in can be directly used for other data sets or additional parameters; for example, the pedestrian's sex. Thus far, no other study using age as a plug-in parameter can be found.

Review of the literature and programs for pedestrian and bicyclist conspicuity

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1984-04-01

Author's abstract: This report reviews literature bearing upon the problem of pedestrian and bicyclist conspicuity, and discusses the activities and accomplishments of various programs conducted to enhance the conspicuity of pedestrians and bicyclist...

Pedestrian temporal and spatial gap acceptance at mid-block street crossing in developing world.

PubMed

Pawar, Digvijay S; Patil, Gopal R

2015-02-01

Most of the midblock pedestrian crossings on urban roads in India are uncontrolled; wherein the high degree of discretion in pedestrians' behavior while crossing the traffic stream, has made the situation complex to analyze. Vehicles do not yield to pedestrians, even though the traffic laws give priority to pedestrians over motorized vehicles at unsignalized pedestrian crossings. Therefore, a pedestrian has to decide if an available gap is safe or not for crossing. This paper aims to investigate pedestrian temporal and spatial gap acceptance for midblock street crossings. Field data were collected using video camera at two midblock pedestrian crossings. The data extraction in laboratory resulted in 1107 pedestrian gaps. Available gaps, pedestrians' decision, traffic volume, etc. were extracted from the videos. While crossing a road with multiple lanes, rolling gap acceptance behavior was observed. Using binary logit analysis, six utility models were developed, three each for temporal and spatial gaps. The 50th percentile temporal and spatial gaps ranged from 4.1 to 4.8s and 67 to 79 m respectively, whereas the 85th percentile temporal and spatial gaps ranged from 5 to 5.8s and 82 to 95 m respectively. These gap values were smaller than that reported in the studies in developed countries. The speed of conflicting vehicle was found to be significant in spatial gap but not in temporal gap acceptance. The gap acceptance decision was also found to be affected by the type of conflicting vehicles. The insights from this study can be used for the safety and performance evaluation of uncontrolled midblock street crossings in developing countries. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ltd and National Safety Council. All rights reserved.

Accidental deaths caused by electricity in Sweden, 1975-2000.

PubMed

Lindström, Richard; Bylund, Per-Olof; Eriksson, Anders

2006-11-01

This study analyzes accidental fatalities caused by electricity--at work and during leisure time--to evaluate risk factors, the role of alcohol, and to identify possible preventive strategies. In Sweden, data on fatalities by electrocution from 1975 through 2000 were collected from the National Cause-of-Death Register. Additional cases were found in the archives of The Swedish National Electrical Safety Board. Suicides and deaths by lightning were excluded. Two hundred and eighty-five deaths were found, including occupational (n=132), leisure time (n=151), and unknown (n=2). Most deaths were caused by aerial power lines, and the most common place for an electrical injury was a railway area or residential property. Postmortem blood from 20% (n=47) of the tested cases was found positive for alcohol, and these persons were killed mainly during leisure time. During the study period, the overall incidence of electricity-related fatalities has decreased, in spite of increased use of electricity. This indicates that safety improvements have been successful.

Investigating Improvements to Pedestrian Crossings with an Emphasis on the Rectangular Rapid-Flashing Beacon

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2015-06-01

The goal of this research effort was to improve pedestrian safety at urban and suburban crossing locations by identifying and evaluating low- to medium-cost pedestrian treatments. The treatments were to have the potential to reduce pedestrian crashes...

Estimation of potential safety benefits for pedestrian crash avoidance/mitigation systems.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2017-04-01

This report presents and exercises a methodology to estimate the effectiveness and potential safety benefits of production pedestrian crash avoidance/mitigation systems. The analysis focuses on light vehicles moving forward and striking a pedestrian ...

Age and pedestrian injury severity in motor-vehicle crashes: a heteroskedastic logit analysis.

PubMed

Kim, Joon-Ki; Ulfarsson, Gudmundur F; Shankar, Venkataraman N; Kim, Sungyop

2008-09-01

This research explores the injury severity of pedestrians in motor-vehicle crashes. It is hypothesized that the variance of unobserved pedestrian characteristics increases with age. In response, a heteroskedastic generalized extreme value model is used. The analysis links explanatory factors with four injury outcomes: fatal, incapacitating, non-incapacitating, and possible or no injury. Police-reported crash data between 1997 and 2000 from North Carolina, USA, are used. The results show that pedestrian age induces heteroskedasticity which affects the probability of fatal injury. The effect grows more pronounced with increasing age past 65. The heteroskedastic model provides a better fit than the multinomial logit model. Notable factors increasing the probability of fatal pedestrian injury: increasing pedestrian age, male driver, intoxicated driver (2.7 times greater probability of fatality), traffic sign, commercial area, darkness with or without streetlights (2-4 times greater probability of fatality), sport-utility vehicle, truck, freeway, two-way divided roadway, speeding-involved, off roadway, motorist turning or backing, both driver and pedestrian at fault, and pedestrian only at fault. Conversely, the probability of a fatal injury decreased: with increasing driver age, during the PM traffic peak, with traffic signal control, in inclement weather, on a curved roadway, at a crosswalk, and when walking along roadway.

The effects of mobile phone use on pedestrian crossing behaviour at signalized and unsignalized intersections.

PubMed

Hatfield, Julie; Murphy, Susanne

2007-01-01

Research amongst drivers suggests that pedestrians using mobile telephones may behave riskily while crossing the road, and casual observation suggests concerning levels of pedestrian mobile-use. An observational field survey of 270 females and 276 males was conducted to compare the safety of crossing behaviours for pedestrians using, versus not using, a mobile phone. Amongst females, pedestrians who crossed while talking on a mobile phone crossed more slowly, and were less likely to look at traffic before starting to cross, to wait for traffic to stop, or to look at traffic while crossing, compared to matched controls. For males, pedestrians who crossed while talking on a mobile phone crossed more slowly at unsignalized crossings. These effects suggest that talking on a mobile phone is associated with cognitive distraction that may undermine pedestrian safety. Messages explicitly suggesting techniques for avoiding mobile-use while road crossing may benefit pedestrian safety.

Car-to-pedestrian collision reconstruction with injury as an evaluation index.

PubMed

Weng, Yiliu; Jin, Xianlong; Zhao, Zhijie; Zhang, Xiaoyun

2010-07-01

Reconstruction of accidents is currently considered as a useful means in the analysis of accidents. By multi-body dynamics and numerical methods, and by adopting vehicle and pedestrian models, the scenario of the crash can often be simulated. When reconstructing the collisions, questions often arise regarding the criteria for the evaluation of simulation results. This paper proposes a reconstruction method for car-to-pedestrian collisions based on injuries of the pedestrians. In this method, pedestrian injury becomes a critical index in judging the correctness of the reconstruction result and guiding the simulation process. Application of this method to a real accident case is also presented in this paper. The study showed a good agreement between injuries obtained by numerical simulation and that by forensic identification. Copyright 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Mapping of pedestrian characteristics and level of service for facilities at Universitas Negeri Malang using geographic information system

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rahayuningsih, Titi; Pranoto, Nindyawati, Umniati, B. Sri; Mardhika, Moch Aqfa Syabahid

2017-09-01

Universitas Negeri Malang (UM) is a university with the second largest academic community in Malang. The activities of the academic community should be supported by adequate facilities, such as pedestrian facilities—crucial yet much neglected matters, so pedestrians to walk along the roadway. As a result, conflicts between pedestrians with motor vehicle users and accidents might occur at any time. This research aimed at: 1) investigating the geometric conditions of pedestrian facilities at UM; 2) identifying the characteristics of pedestrians and the pedestrian facilities at UM; and 3) determining the level of service for pedestrian facilities at UM using Geographic Information System (GIS). The research was conducted through survey of location, survey of geometric conditions, estimation of the number of pedestrians using sidewalk (data were recorded every 15 minutes), measurement of pedestrian speed, and questionnaire about pedestrians' identity, destination, as well as travel time and distance. Data analysis was carried out to identify the pedestrian characteristics, pedestrian flow characteristics, and pedestrian level of service. The research result showed that the percentage of road segments in campus without sidewalks was 52%. The average width of sidewalk was 1.33 m, which was less than the minimum standard of i.e. 2 m. In terms of pedestrian characteristics, the pedestrians consisted of more female (51%) who were mostly students of the Faculty of Letters whose destination was classroom building. The maximum pedestrian flow was at 10.00-13.30 i.e. 4.2018 p/m/min. The average speed of pedestrian was 63.49 m/min. The highest pedestrian density of 0.0609 p/m2 occurred at 10.00-13.30. The largest walking space was 28.0348 m2/p and occurred in the afternoon at 13.30-17.00. The level of service for pedestrian facilities belonged to category A in the morning and afternoon. The level of service at 10.00-13.30 decreased to category B.

Factors associated with fatal pedestrian crashes in Virginia's urban areas-1985-1987 : final report.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1991-01-01

Between 1985 and 1987, a total of 400 pedestrians were fatally injured in Virginia; more than half of the pedestrian fatalities occurred in an urban area of the Commonwealth. Because little research had been conducted on urban pedestrian fatalities i...

The development and test of urban and rural pedestrian safety messages

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1985-01-01

The objective of this project was to identify, develop and produce public education messages for pedestrian safety. Pedestrian accident types and situations which had not been previously addressed through public education were selected. These include...

Empirically-based performance assessment & simulation of pedestrian behavior at unsignalized crossings.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2014-09-01

The objective of this research was to provide an improved understanding of pedestrian-vehicle interaction : at mid-block pedestrian crossings and develop methods that can be used in traffic operational analysis and : microsimulation packages. Models ...

Idaho Bicycle and Pedestrian Transportation

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1995-01-01

The Idaho Bicycle and Pedestrian Transportation Plan of Idaho's long range transportation planning process sets the stage for changes in our transportation mix. The plan is about expanding options for personal transportation. Most importantly, it is ...

Development Study of Pedestrian Bridge at Gramedia Bookstore Jalan Raden Intan Bandar Lampung

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bernaditha, C. M.

2018-03-01

Bandar Lampung with high enough population densities has provides transportation facilities for pedestrian such as pedestrian bridge. This pedestrian bridges spread at Bandar Lampung’s traffic congested area, shopping centre nor education centre. Jl. Raden Intan as one of primary collector road with four lanes one direction at Bandar Lampung has high LHR (average daily traffic) movemenet pattern especially at morning, day and afternoon rush hour that make it difficult for pedestrian who want to cross the road. Therefore pedes trian bridge at this section Jl. Raden Intan highly needed especially at in front of Gramedia Bookstore with large amount of crossing pedestrian volume. From this research and analysis, found that number of LHR (average daily traffic) at Jl. Raden Intan shows large number traffic volume that is 4509 passenger car unit/hour at morning rush hour (07.00-08.30), with value of V/C Ratio or Degree of Saturation reach 0,92 (E category), while the amount of pedestrian who cross ahead from Gramedia Bookstore to Bank Muammalat is 29 people per 15 minutes. Other than that based on the calculation results of pedestrian volume and traffic volume at rush hour as follow: average pedestrian volume at rush hour is 146 people/hour between the range 100-1250 people/hour and traffic volume 7521 vehicles/hour over than 7000 vehicles/hour, and also the value PV2=1,682x1010 which is means the value of PV2 worth over 2x108, moreover the speed plan Jl. Raden Intan between 60-80 km/hour above 70 km/hour. Based on the calculation and analysis above, it can be concluded transportation facilities recommended for Jl. Raden Intan is pedestrian bridge.

The effects of traffic calming measures on pedestrian and motorist behavior

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2001-08-01

Traffic calming treatments may benefit pedestrians who are crossing the street by slowing down vehicle traffic, shortening crossing distances, and enhancing motorist and pedestrian visibility. The objective of this study is to evaluate the effects of...

Using Theory to Guide Practice in Children's Pedestrian Safety Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Cross, Donna; Hall, Margaret; Howat, Peter

2003-01-01

Few pedestrian injury prevention programs appear to articulate the theory upon which their design and evaluation are based. This article describes how theory was used to plan, develop, implement, and evaluate the educational component of a comprehensive child pedestrian intervention. Organizational and planning theories were used to guide the…

Non-accidental carbon monoxide poisoning from burning charcoal in attempted combined homicide-suicide.

PubMed

Lee, A C W; Ou, Y; Lam, S Y; So, K T; Kam, C W

2002-10-01

To describe an emerging form of serious child abuse in combined homicide-suicide in Hong Kong. This is a retrospective hospital chart review in a regional hospital in Hong Kong from January to December 2000. Eight children, with a mean age of 7.8 years (range 0.5-11 years), from four families were admitted to hospital because of non-accidental exposure to carbon monoxide when their parents attempted suicide by burning charcoal. A 7-year-old boy died on arrival. His 5.6-year-old sister and another 6-month-old boy had cerebral hypoxia on admission. Hyperbaric oxygen therapy was used in both cases, with rapid improvement, although there were persistent neurological deficits in the girl. The other children in the present study were asymptomatic and none had delayed neurological sequelae. Concomitant use of sedatives was also detected in three of the surviving patients. Non-accidental poisoning with carbon monoxide appears to be a new means of child abuse with potentially serious consequences. Concomitant intoxication with psychotropic drugs is common in such cases. The reason for parents killing their own children under such circumstances was unclear, but a desire to exact revenge on an estranged partner was suggested.

Fatally injured pedestrians and bicyclists in the United States with high blood alcohol concentrations.

PubMed

Eichelberger, Angela H; McCartt, Anne T; Cicchino, Jessica B

2018-06-01

Little research has focused on the problem of alcohol impairment among pedestrians and bicyclists in the United States. The aim of the current study was to investigate the prevalence, trends, and characteristics of alcohol-impaired fatally injured pedestrians and bicyclists. Data from the Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) were analyzed for fatally injured passenger vehicle drivers, pedestrians, and bicyclists 16 and older during 1982-2014. Logistic regression models examined whether personal, roadway, and crash characteristics were associated with high blood alcohol concentrations (BACs) among fatally injured pedestrians and bicyclists. From 1982 to 2014, the percentage of fatally injured pedestrians with high BACs (≥0.08g/dL) declined from 45% to 35%, and the percentage of fatally injured bicyclists with high BACs declined from 28% to 21%. By comparison, the percentage of fatally injured passenger vehicle drivers with high BACs declined from 51% in 1982 to 32% in 2014. The largest reductions in alcohol impairment among fatally injured pedestrians and bicyclists were found among ages 16-20. During 2010-2014, fatally injured pedestrians and bicyclists ages 40-49 had the highest odds of having a high BAC, compared with other age groups. A substantial proportion of fatally injured pedestrians and bicyclists have high BACs, and this proportion has declined less dramatically than for fatally injured passenger vehicle drivers during the past three decades. Most countermeasures used to address alcohol-impaired driving may have only limited effectiveness in reducing fatalities among alcohol-impaired pedestrians and bicyclists. Efforts should increase public awareness of the risk of walking or bicycling when impaired. Results suggest the primary target audience for educational campaigns directed at pedestrians and bicyclists is middle-age males. Further research should evaluate the effectiveness of potential countermeasures, such as lowering speeds or improving

Development of Statewide Guidelines for Implementing Leading Pedestrian Intervals in Florida

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2017-12-01

Pedestrian safety is an ongoing major concern throughout the United States and is one of the highest priorities for the Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT). Vehicles often fail to yield to pedestrians at intersections, especially when pedestr...

Pedestrians' adherence to road traffic regulations on the N1 Highway in Accra, Ghana.

PubMed

Noora, Charles Lwanga; Afari, Edwin Andrews; Nuoh, Robert Domo; Adjei, Eric Yirenkyi; Anthony, Gershon Kobla; Abdulai, Marijanatu; Sackey, Samuel Oko; Kenu, Ernest; Nyarko, Kofi Mensah

2016-01-01

Pedestrian behavior and adherence to road traffic regulation is vital in the prevention and control of road traffic accidents (RTA) especially on highways in Ghana. We assessed pedestrians' adherence to road crossing regulations on the George Walker Bush (N1) Highway in Accra. We conducted a cross sectional study of pedestrians crossing the N1 highway from both sides of the road between 7:00 am and 11:00am. We observed all pedestrians using a checklist and interviewed 413 using a structured questionnaire. We collected data on basic demographics, and pedestrians' knowledge on road crossing (exposures). Data was, cleaned and analyzed using Epi-info version 3.5.4. Pearson Chi-square was used to assess differences in proportions for categorical variables. Binary logistic regression was used to test for association between pedestrian choice of route and exposures. We observed (n = 1856) pedestrians crossing the road during the study period; 1155 (62.2%) males, 461 (24.8%) did not use the approved route(s). Majority 317(76.8%) were adults between the ages of 20-49, mostly males 265 (56.4%). Most people (92.7%) had at least basic education. AOR for sex (male) was 1.7(1.1-2.6), and regular use of Highway (always) was 0.4(0.2-0.8) at 95% CI. One out of every 4pedestrians using the N1 Highway used an unapproved route. Majority of pedestrians who regularly cross the Highway at unapproved routes were males. We recommend vigorous public education and addition of more footbridges.

Spatial displacement among pedestrians: a cross-cultural replication.

PubMed

Rawdon, V A; Willis, F N

1993-10-01

An observational study of pedestrians in a shopping mall in a mid-western U.S. city was replicated in shopping malls in London. The avoidance movements of 2692 shoppers were recorded as they approached other shoppers. The relationships between these movements and the shoppers' gender, age, race, group size, and other characteristics were examined. Results of both studies indicated that men were likely to be displaced by women, smaller groups by larger ones, and nonhandicapped persons by handicapped ones. The results differed, however, with respect to race, with black persons tending to displace white individuals in the Midwest regardless of group size, while lone white pedestrians tended to displace lone black pedestrians in London. In London larger groups tended to displace smaller ones regardless of race. Hypotheses regarding spatial displacement were discussed. The need for more cross-situational and cross-cultural research in social psychology was clear.

Guiding Blind Pedestrians with a Personal Navigation System

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Dodson, A. H.; Moon, G. V.; Moore, T.; Jones, D.

With the assistance provided by the white cane or guide dog, most blind pedestrians can find their way to known destinations along familiar routes. Finding new or known destinations along unfamiliar routes is more challenging. Before such a journey is attempted, detailed instructions must be acquired. The difficulty of obtaining and then reliably following such instructions deters many blind pedestrians from travelling alone in unknown areas. This paper demonstrates a technological approach, by way of field trials, that supplements the existing aids and eliminates the need for sighted guides. The approach has the potential to offer greater independence to the blind person. The investigation suggests that the methodology used in personal navigation systems for the sighted is sub-optimal for guiding the blind pedestrian. Suitable extensions are introduced, and the results show the proposed methodology is efficient for guiding the blind individual to unknown destinations in the chosen field trial environment.

Velocity correlations and spatial dependencies between neighbors in a unidirectional flow of pedestrians

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Porzycki, Jakub; WÄ s, Jarosław; Hedayatifar, Leila; Hassanibesheli, Forough; Kułakowski, Krzysztof

2017-08-01

The aim of the paper is an analysis of self-organization patterns observed in the unidirectional flow of pedestrians. On the basis of experimental data from Zhang et al. [J. Zhang et al., J. Stat. Mech. (2011) P06004, 10.1088/1742-5468/2011/06/P06004], we analyze the mutual positions and velocity correlations between pedestrians when walking along a corridor. The angular and spatial dependencies of the mutual positions reveal a spatial structure that remains stable during the crowd motion. This structure differs depending on the value of n , for the consecutive n th -nearest-neighbor position set. The preferred position for the first-nearest neighbor is on the side of the pedestrian, while for further neighbors, this preference shifts to the axis of movement. The velocity correlations vary with the angle formed by the pair of neighboring pedestrians and the direction of motion and with the time delay between pedestrians' movements. The delay dependence of the correlations shows characteristic oscillations, produced by the velocity oscillations when striding; however, a filtering of the main frequency of individual striding out reduces the oscillations only partially. We conclude that pedestrians select their path directions so as to evade the necessity of continuously adjusting their speed to their neighbors'. They try to keep a given distance, but follow the person in front of them, as well as accepting and observing pedestrians on their sides. Additionally, we show an empirical example that illustrates the shape of a pedestrian's personal space during movement.

A novel framework to evaluate pedestrian safety at non-signalized locations.

PubMed

Fu, Ting; Miranda-Moreno, Luis; Saunier, Nicolas

2018-02-01

This paper proposes a new framework to evaluate pedestrian safety at non-signalized crosswalk locations. In the proposed framework, the yielding maneuver of a driver in response to a pedestrian is split into the reaction and braking time. Hence, the relationship of the distance required for a yielding maneuver and the approaching vehicle speed depends on the reaction time of the driver and deceleration rate that the vehicle can achieve. The proposed framework is represented in the distance-velocity (DV) diagram and referred as the DV model. The interactions between approaching vehicles and pedestrians showing the intention to cross are divided in three categories: i) situations where the vehicle cannot make a complete stop, ii) situations where the vehicle's ability to stop depends on the driver reaction time, and iii) situations where the vehicle can make a complete stop. Based on these classifications, non-yielding maneuvers are classified as "non-infraction non-yielding" maneuvers, "uncertain non-yielding" maneuvers and "non-yielding" violations, respectively. From the pedestrian perspective, crossing decisions are classified as dangerous crossings, risky crossings and safe crossings accordingly. The yielding compliance and yielding rate, as measures of the yielding behavior, are redefined based on these categories. Time to crossing and deceleration rate required for the vehicle to stop are used to measure the probability of collision. Finally, the framework is demonstrated through a case study in evaluating pedestrian safety at three different types of non-signalized crossings: a painted crosswalk, an unprotected crosswalk, and a crosswalk controlled by stop signs. Results from the case study suggest that the proposed framework works well in describing pedestrian-vehicle interactions which helps in evaluating pedestrian safety at non-signalized crosswalk locations. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Safety assessment on pedestrian crossing environments using MLS data.

PubMed

Soilán, Mario; Riveiro, Belén; Sánchez-Rodríguez, Ana; Arias, Pedro

2018-02-01

In the framework of infrastructure analysis and maintenance in an urban environment, it is important to address the safety of every road user. This paper presents a methodology for the evaluation of several safety indicators on pedestrian crossing environments using geometric and radiometric information extracted from 3D point clouds collected by a Mobile Mapping System (MMS). The methodology is divided in four main modules which analyze the accessibility of the crossing area, the presence of traffic lights and traffic signs, and the visibility between a driver and a pedestrian on the proximities of a pedestrian crossing. The outputs of the analysis are exported to a Geographic Information System (GIS) where they are visualized and can be further processed in the context of city management. The methodology has been tested on approximately 30 pedestrian crossings in cluttered urban environments of two different cities. Results show that MMS are a valid mean to assess the safety of a specific urban environment, regarding its geometric conditions. Remarkable results are presented on traffic light classification, with a global F-score close to 95%. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Community-based pedestrian safety training in virtual reality : a pragmatic trial.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2015-06-01

Child pedestrian injuries are a leading cause of mortality and morbidity across the United States : and the world. Repeated practice at the cognitive-perceptual task of crossing a street may lead to : safer pedestrian behavior. Virtual reality offers...

Pedestrian safety, the identification of precipitating factors and possible countermeasures : appendices.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1971-01-01

The study objective was to identify causes and countermeasures : re levant to pedestrian accidents. Behaviora 1 and descriptive data were : collected by interviews and on-scene observations for over 2,000 pedestrian : iccidents in 13 major cities. Su...

Transit bus stop pedestrian warning application : architecture and design : final report.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2017-02-28

This document describes the Draft System Architecture and Design for the Transit Bus Stop Pedestrian Warning (TSPW) application including the design for the pedestrian detection system and DSRC radio to be deployed at transit stops and includes detai...

Zone guide for pedestrian safety

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2008-12-01

Just as communities can efficiently mount crime prevention programs by focusing them in high-crime areas, they can also efficiently concentrate pedestrian safety improvements by carefully selecting where they are applied. To do this, they need to be ...

Pedestrian accessibility at signalized intersections.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2009-09-01

This product is formatted as a chapter to be included in a current or future TxDOT manual. The chapter : presents guidance on the use and placement of selected treatments to accommodate pedestrian accessibility at : signalized intersections. Specific...

Experimental research on pedestrian lower leg impact

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Constantin, B. A.; Iozsa, D. M.; Stan, C.

2017-10-01

The present paper is centred on the research of deceleration measured at the level of the lower leg during a pedestrian impact in multiple load cases. Basically, the used methodology for physical test setup is similar to EuroNCAP and European Union regulatory requirements. Due cost reduction reasons, it was not used a pneumatic system in order to launch the lower leg impactor in the direction of the vehicle front-end. During the test it was used an opposite solution, namely the vehicle being in motion, aiming the standstill lower leg impactor. The impactor has similar specifications to those at EU level, i.e. dimensions, materials, and principle of measurement of the deceleration magnitude. Therefore, all the results obtained during the study comply with the requirements of both EU regulation and EuroNCAP. As a limitation, due to unavailability of proper sensors in the equipment of the lower leg impactor, that could provide precise results, the bending angle, the shearing and the detailed data at the level of knee ligaments were not evaluated. The knee joint should be improved for future studies as some bending angles observed during the post processing of several impact video files were too high comparing to other studies. The paper highlights the first pedestrian impact physical test conducted by the author, following an extensive research in the field. Deceleration at the level of pedestrian knee can be substantially improved by providing enough volume between the bumper fascia and the front-end structure and by using pedestrian friendly materials for shock absorbers, such as foams.

Integrability conditions for Killing-Yano tensors and conformal Killing-Yano tensors

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Batista, Carlos

2015-01-01

The integrability conditions for the existence of a conformal Killing-Yano tensor of arbitrary order are worked out in all dimensions and expressed in terms of the Weyl tensor. As a consequence, the integrability conditions for the existence of a Killing-Yano tensor are also obtained. By means of such conditions, it is shown that in certain Einstein spaces one can use a conformal Killing-Yano tensor of order p to generate a Killing-Yano tensor of order (p -1 ) . Finally, it is proved that in maximally symmetric spaces the covariant derivative of a Killing-Yano tensor is a closed conformal Killing-Yano tensor and that every conformal Killing-Yano tensor is uniquely decomposed as the sum of a Killing-Yano tensor and a closed conformal Killing-Yano tensor.

A review of pelvic fractures in adult pedestrians: experimental studies involving PMHS used to determine injury criteria for pedestrian dummies and component test procedures.

PubMed

Arregui-Dalmases, Carlos; Kerrigan, Jason R; Sanchez-Molina, David; Velazquez-Ameijide, Juan; Crandall, Jeff R

2015-01-01

Perform a systematic review for the most relevant pelvic injury research involving PMHS. The review begins with an explanation of the pelvic anatomy and a general description of pelvic fracture patterns followed by the particular case of pelvic fractures sustained in pedestrian-vehicle collisions. Field data documenting the vehicle, crash, and human risk factors for pedestrian pelvic injuries are assessed. A summary of full-scale PMHS tests and subsystem lateral pelvic tests is provided with an interpretation of the most significant findings for the most relevant studies. Based on the mechanisms of pedestrian pelvic injury, force, acceleration, and velocity and compression have been assessed as predictive variables by researchers although no consensus criterion exists.

The effect of an overpass on pedestrian injuries on a major highway in Kampala - Uganda.

PubMed

Mutto, Milton; Kobusingye, Olive C; Lett, Ronald R

2002-12-01

To describe the pedestrian population, their use of an overpass, and to assess pedestrian perceptions and responses to the risk of traffic crashes, determine pedestrian injuries in relation to traffic flow, and compare traffic crash and pedestrian injury rates before and after the overpass construction. The study was conducted in Nakawa trading center approximately six kilometers from the center of Kampala city on a major highway. The trading center has a busy market, small retail shops, industries, a sports stadium, offices, low cost housing estates, schools, and an estimated population of 6,226 residents, 15.1% of them students. Pedestrian road behavior and traffic patterns were observed, and police traffic crash records reviewed, one year before and one year after overpass construction. A convenient sample of overpass and non-overpass users was interviewed to assess their perceptions of risk. A total of 13,064 pedestrians were observed (male: female ratio= 2.2:1). The overall prevalence of pedestrian overpass use was 35.4%. A bigger proportion of females (49.1%) crossed on the overpass compared to males (29.2%). More children (79.7%) than adults (27.3%) used the overpass. The majority of pedestrians (77.9%) were worried about their safety in traffic but only 6.6% thought of the overpass as an appropriate means to avoid traffic accidents. Traffic was not segregated by vehicle type. Mean traffic flow varied from 41.5 vehicles per minute between 0730-0830 hours, to 39.3 vehicles per minute between 1030-1130 hours and 37.7 vehicles per minute between 1730-1830 hours. The proportion of heavy vehicles (lorries, trailers, tankers, and tractors) increased from 3.3% of total vehicle volume in the morning to 5.4% in the evening (t = 2.847, p <0.05); 44.0% of the collisions occurred in the evening with 35 pedestrian casualties before and 70 after the overpass intervention. The prevalence of pedestrian overpass use was low with adult males least likely to use it

Sharing the road : optimizing pedestrian and bicycle safety and vehicle mobility.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2012-04-01

Reducing crashes involving pedestrians and bicyclists continues to be a major concern in the design of Michigan roads. In seeking to improve the safety of pedestrians, bicyclists, and motorists on Michigan roads, it is important to balance the needs ...

Killing-Yano tensors in spaces admitting a hypersurface orthogonal Killing vector

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Garfinkle, David; Glass, E. N.

2013-03-01

Methods are presented for finding Killing-Yano tensors, conformal Killing-Yano tensors, and conformal Killing vectors in spacetimes with a hypersurface orthogonal Killing vector. These methods are similar to a method developed by the authors for finding Killing tensors. In all cases one decomposes both the tensor and the equation it satisfies into pieces along the Killing vector and pieces orthogonal to the Killing vector. Solving the separate equations that result from this decomposition requires less computing than integrating the original equation. In each case, examples are given to illustrate the method.

Pedestrian injuries resulting from road traffic accidents: the Azare experience.

PubMed

Umaru, H; Ahidjo, A; Dogo, H

2007-01-01

Road traffic accident (RTA) is a leading cause of serious morbidity and mortality world wide. The pedestrians are not spared from this epidemic. The aim of this study is to identify factors that puts the pedestrian at risk of injuries from RTA and the anatomical regions most commonly involved in our environment and suggest ways of curbing them. This was a one-year retrospective study of 122 pedestrian casualties resulting from road traffic accident attending the Accident and Emergency (A/E) Unit of the Federal Medical Centre, Azare. Majority of the patients (72%) were males with a male to female ratio of 2.6:1. Children and adolescents constitute 54.1% of the casualties. Motorcycles were responsible for most of the pedestrian injuries (73%). The head and neck was the most frequently injured anatomical region of the body (43.4%), followed by the extremities (37%). The months of August and January were the peak periods of injuries. The safety of pedestrian is seriously threatened by the growing popularity of commercial motorcycles on our roads. Preventive measures are advocated to ensure only licensed cyclists are allowed on the roads. Adequate personnel training to manage head injury in our centers is also advised. More patrol by the road safety agents is advised in the months of January and August.

Teach Children Pedestrian Safety.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Faber, Marilyn M.

1997-01-01

Provides advice on teaching children safe pedestrian and bicycling skills to reduce accidents caused by mistakes made in crossing streets. Provides an interactive safe-walker's story, tips for walking safely, step-by-step instructions for safe street crossing, bicycle safety information, a quiz for safe biking, and guidelines to ensure a proper…

Development of safety information materials and media plans for elderly pedestrians

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1993-06-01

The objectives of this study were to: 1) develop pedestrian safety messages which will have a countermeasure effect on the specific types of accidents occurring to elderly pedestrians and 2) develop media plans for use by NHTSA in disseminating the i...

Identification of Child Pedestrian Training Objectives: The Role of Task Analysis and Empirical Research.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

van der Molen, Hugo H.

1984-01-01

Describes a study designed to demonstrate that child pedestrian training objectives may be identified systematically through various task analysis methods, making use of different types of empirical information. Early approaches to analysis of pedestrian tasks are reviewed, and an outline of the Traffic Research Centre's pedestrian task analysis…

The effects of pedestrian countdown timers on safety and efficiency of operations at signalized intersections.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2011-12-01

Pedestrian countdown timers are becoming common at urban and suburban intersections. The added information that : pedestrian countdown timers provide to pedestrians can also be used by approaching drivers. A before-and-after case study : on the effec...

Efficacy of virtual reality in pedestrian safety research.

PubMed

Deb, Shuchisnigdha; Carruth, Daniel W; Sween, Richard; Strawderman, Lesley; Garrison, Teena M

2017-11-01

Advances in virtual reality technology present new opportunities for human factors research in areas that are dangerous, difficult, or expensive to study in the real world. The authors developed a new pedestrian simulator using the HTC Vive head mounted display and Unity software. Pedestrian head position and orientation were tracked as participants attempted to safely cross a virtual signalized intersection (5.5 m). In 10% of 60 trials, a vehicle violated the traffic signal and in 10.84% of these trials, a collision between the vehicle and the pedestrian was observed. Approximately 11% of the participants experienced simulator sickness and withdrew from the study. Objective measures, including the average walking speed, indicate that participant behavior in VR matches published real world norms. Subjective responses indicate that the virtual environment was realistic and engaging. Overall, the study results confirm the effectiveness of the new virtual reality technology for research on full motion tasks. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Identification and test of pedestrian safety messages for public education programs

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1975-03-01

A review of the literature and data from pedestrian accident research was used as input to an analysis which developed 14 message contents. Each of these is directed at a specific aspect of the identified pedestrian accident problem. Seven of the mes...

Identifying countermeasure strategies to increase safety of older pedestrians : traffic tech.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2013-07-01

Pedestrian deaths accounted for 13% of all traffic fatalities : in 2010. While adults 65 and older made up 13% of the U.S. : population, they accounted for 19% of all pedestrian fatalities : in 2010. This age group is rapidly expanding in size : and ...

Auditory detectability of hybrid electric vehicles by pedestrians who are blind

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2010-11-15

Quieter cars such as electric vehicles (EVs) and hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs) may reduce auditory cues used by pedestrians to assess the state of nearby traffic and, as a result, their use may have an adverse impact on pedestrian safety. In order ...

Cellular automata model for urban road traffic flow considering pedestrian crossing street

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhao, Han-Tao; Yang, Shuo; Chen, Xiao-Xu

2016-11-01

In order to analyze the effect of pedestrians' crossing street on vehicle flows, we investigated traffic characteristics of vehicles and pedestrians. Based on that, rules of lane changing, acceleration, deceleration, randomization and update are modified. Then we established two urban two-lane cellular automata models of traffic flow, one of which is about sections with non-signalized crosswalk and the other is on uncontrolled sections with pedestrians crossing street at random. MATLAB is used for numerical simulation of the different traffic conditions; meanwhile space-time diagram and relational graphs of traffic flow parameters are generated and then comparatively analyzed. Simulation results indicate that when vehicle density is lower than around 25 vehs/(km lane), pedestrians have modest impact on traffic flow, whereas when vehicle density is higher than about 60 vehs/(km lane), traffic speed and volume will decrease significantly especially on sections with non-signal-controlled crosswalk. The results illustrate that the proposed models reconstruct the traffic flow's characteristic with the situation where there are pedestrians crossing and can provide some practical reference for urban traffic management.

Effect of interactions between vehicles and pedestrians on fuel consumption and emissions

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Li, Xiang; Sun, Jian-Qiao

2014-12-01

This paper presents a study of variations of fuel consumption and emissions of vehicles due to random street crossings of pedestrians. The pedestrian and vehicle movement models as well as the interaction model between the two entities are presented. Extensive numerical simulations of single and multiple cars are carried out to investigate the traffic flow rate, vehicle average speed, fuel consumption, CO, HC and NOx emissions. Generally more noncompliant road-crossings of pedestrians lead to higher level of fuel consumptions and emissions of vehicles, and the traffic situation can be improved by imposing higher vehicle speed limit to some extent. Different traffic characteristics in low and high vehicle density regions are studied. The traffic flow is more influenced by crossing pedestrians in the low vehicle density region, while in the high vehicle density region, the interactions among vehicles dominate. The main contribution of this paper lies in the qualitative analysis of the impact of the interactions between pedestrians and vehicles on the traffic, its energy economy and emissions.

Child Pedestrian Injury: A Review of Behavioral Risks and Preventive Strategies

PubMed Central

Schwebel, David C.; Davis, Aaron L.; O’Neal, Elizabeth E.

2011-01-01

Pedestrian injury is among the leading causes of pediatric death in the United States and much of the world. This paper is divided into two sections. First, we review the literature on behavioral risk factors for child injury. Cognitive and perceptual development risks are discussed. The roles of distraction, temperament and personality, and social influences from parents and peers are presented. We conclude the first section with brief reviews of environmental risks, pedestrian safety among special populations, and the role of sleep and fatigue on pediatric pedestrian safety. The second section of the review considers child pedestrian injury prevention strategies. Categorized by mode of presentation, we discuss parent instruction strategies, school-based instruction strategies (including crossing guards), and streetside training techniques. Technology-based training strategies using video, internet, and virtual reality are reviewed. We conclude the section on prevention with discussion of community-based interventions. PMID:23066380

Compliance of Ultra-Orthodox and secular pedestrians with traffic lights in Ultra-Orthodox and secular locations.

PubMed

Rosenbloom, Tova; Shahar, Amit; Perlman, Amotz

2008-11-01

Following a previous study that revealed the disobedience of Ultra-Orthodox citizens, as compared to secular citizens, of traffic lights at crosswalks, the present study examined the road habits of 995 Ultra-Orthodox and secular pedestrians in neighboring Ultra-Orthodox and secular cities. Using an observation grid designed specially for this study, the pedestrians were observed at two crosswalks--one in an Ultra-Orthodox city and one in a secular city--as far as similar traffic parameters, using a logistic regression. The tendency to cross on a red light was assessed as a function of estimated age, gender, religiosity, location (religious/secular), the duration of the red light, the number of vehicles crossing and the number of pedestrians waiting at the curb. Ultra-Orthodox pedestrians committed more violations than secular pedestrians did, and there were more road violations in the Ultra-Orthodox location than there were in the secular location. Fewer traffic violations were committed by "local" pedestrians (Ultra-Orthodox pedestrians in the Ultra-Orthodox location and secular pedestrians in the secular location) than by "foreigners" (Ultra-Orthodox pedestrians in the secular location and secular pedestrians in the Ultra-Orthodox location). The odds of crossing on a red light decreased as a function of both the number of people waiting at the curb and the number of vehicles. Consistent with previous research, males crossed on red much more than females did, regardless of religiosity and location. Our discussion focuses on theoretical and practical explanations of the findings.

Measuring pedestrian volumes and conflicts. Volume IV, Pedestrian/vehicle accident prediction model : a users manual

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1988-03-01

Users of this manual are expected to be researchers who are attempting to develop models that can be used to predict occurrence of pedestrian accidents in a particular city. The manual presents guidelines in the development of such models. A group-...

Severity of child pedestrian injuries due to bonnet-type-vehicle collision.

PubMed

Hitosugi, Masahito; Kawato, Hitoshi; Gomei, Sayaka; Mizuno, Koji; Tokudome, Shogo

2013-10-01

The aim of this study was to clarify the pattern of child pedestrian injury, injury severity, and its relation to collision velocity in bonnet-type-vehicle collision. In-depth data were retrospectively collected from the Institute for Traffic Accident Research and Data Analysis on pedestrians younger than 13 years old with any bodily injuries from collisions with bonnet-type vehicles between 1993 and 2004. Forty-seven patients from 43 collisions with a mean age of 6.9 ± 2.5 years were included in the study. Injury severity was not significantly different between patients who were hit by the front of the vehicle and those who were hit by the side of the vehicle. In front collisions, impact with the vehicle was associated with significantly higher Abbreviated Injury Scale (AIS) scores than those for impact with the road, especially for the lower extremities (mean: 1.2 vs 0.2, P < 0.001). Injury severity of the lower extremities and collision velocity were examined. The estimated collision velocity of the vehicle was not significantly different between patients with lower extremity AIS scores of 0 or 1 and those of 2 or 3. Some pediatric pedestrians suffer from collisions with bonnet-type vehicles without lower extremity fractures owing to the characteristics of child pedestrians. Providing injury prevention programs for children in communities and schools, developing active safety devices in the vehicle, and modifying the vehicle body to a pediatric pedestrian-friendly structure may increase pedestrian protection. © 2013 The Authors. Pediatrics International © 2013 Japan Pediatric Society.

Federal Highway Administration university course on bicycle and pedestrian transportation. Lesson 2

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2006-07-01

The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) University Course on Bicycle and Pedestrian Transportation contains modular resource material that is intended for use in university courses on bicycle and pedestrian transportation. This lesson explores the ...

Federal Highway Administration university course on bicycle and pedestrian transportation. Lesson 1

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2006-07-01

The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) University Course on Bicycle and Pedestrian Transportation contains modular resource material that is intended for use in university courses on bicycle and pedestrian transportation. This lesson explores the ...

Estimating the value of life and injury for pedestrians using a stated preference framework.

PubMed

Niroomand, Naghmeh; Jenkins, Glenn P

2017-09-01

The incidence of pedestrian death over the period 2010 to 2014 per 1000,000 in North Cyprus is about 2.5 times that of the EU, with 10.5 times more pedestrian road injuries than deaths. With the prospect of North Cyprus entering the EU, many investments need to be undertaken to improve road safety in order to reach EU benchmarks. We conducted a stated choice experiment to identify the preferences and tradeoffs of pedestrians in North Cyprus for improved walking times, pedestrian costs, and safety. The choice of route was examined using mixed logit models to obtain the marginal utilities associated with each attribute of the routes that consumers chose. These were used to estimate the individuals' willingness to pay (WTP) to save walking time and to avoid pedestrian fatalities and injuries. We then used the results to obtain community-wide estimates of the value of a statistical life (VSL) saved, the value of an injury (VI) prevented, and the value per hour of walking time saved. The estimate of the VSL was €699,434 and the estimate of VI was €20,077. These values are consistent, after adjusting for differences in incomes, with the median results of similar studies done for EU countries. The estimated value of time to pedestrians is €7.20 per person hour. The ratio of deaths to injuries is much higher for pedestrians than for road accidents, and this is completely consistent with the higher estimated WTP to avoid a pedestrian accident than to avoid a car accident. The value of time of €7.20 is quite high relative to the wages earned. Findings provide a set of information on the VRR for fatalities and injuries and the value of pedestrian time that is critical for conducing ex ante appraisals of investments to improve pedestrian safety. Copyright © 2017 National Safety Council and Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Bicycle and pedestrian detection : final report

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2003-02-27

With the development of ITS applications, automated pedestrian detectors are beginning to compliment the existing pushbutton detectors. These applications optimize intersection operations and improve safety by reducing the conflicts between vehicles ...

A framework for improved safety and accessibility through pedestrian guidance and navigation.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2015-07-01

With the changes in America's demographics comes a need to provide improved accommodation of individuals : with reduced capabilities. To date, our research has focused upon assistive pedestrian signal technologies for : pedestrians with impaired visi...

Experiential Exposure to Texting and Walking in Virtual Reality: A Randomized Trial to Reduce Distracted Pedestrian Behavior

PubMed Central

Schwebel, David C.; McClure, Leslie A.; Porter, Bryan E.

2017-01-01

Background Distracted pedestrian behavior is a significant public health concern, as research suggests distracted pedestrians have significantly higher risk of injury compared to fully attentive pedestrians. Despite this, efforts to reduce distracted pedestrian behavior are scant. Objective Using a repeated measures experimental research design, we implemented a behavioral intervention to reduce distracted pedestrian behavior in the high-risk environment of an urban college campus and simultaneously monitored behavior on a control urban college campus not exposed to the intervention. We had two primary aims: reduce perceived vulnerability to injury among individual pedestrians and reduce distracted pedestrian behavior in the environment through a change in community-based norms. Methods The hallmark of the behavioral intervention was a week-long opportunity for community members to experience personally the risks of distracted pedestrian behavior by attempting to cross a virtual pedestrian environment street while text-messaging. This was supplemented by traditional and social marketing and publicity through various campus partners. A sample of 219 individuals completed self-report surveys about perceived vulnerability to distracted pedestrian injury before experiencing the distracted virtual street-crossing and again after 2 weeks and 5 months. Observational assessment of distracted pedestrian behavior was conducted at a busy intersection on the campus as well as at a control campus not exposed to the intervention at baseline, post-intervention, 10 weeks, and 6 months. Results The intervention achieved mixed results. Individuals exposed to texting within a simulated pedestrian environment reported changes in their intentions to cross streets while distracted and in perceived vulnerability to risk while crossing streets, but we did not witness evidence of changed community norms based on observed rates of distracted pedestrian behavior before and after the

Experiential exposure to texting and walking in virtual reality: A randomized trial to reduce distracted pedestrian behavior.

PubMed

Schwebel, David C; McClure, Leslie A; Porter, Bryan E

2017-05-01

Distracted pedestrian behavior is a significant public health concern, as research suggests distracted pedestrians have significantly higher risk of injury compared to fully attentive pedestrians. Despite this, efforts to reduce distracted pedestrian behavior are scant. Using a repeated measures experimental research design, we implemented a behavioral intervention to reduce distracted pedestrian behavior in the high-risk environment of an urban college campus and simultaneously monitored behavior on a control urban college campus not exposed to the intervention. We had two primary aims: reduce perceived vulnerability to injury among individual pedestrians and reduce distracted pedestrian behavior in the environment through a change in community-based norms. The hallmark of the behavioral intervention was a week-long opportunity for community members to experience personally the risks of distracted pedestrian behavior by attempting to cross a virtual pedestrian environment street while text-messaging. This was supplemented by traditional and social marketing and publicity through various campus partners. A sample of 219 individuals completed self-report surveys about perceived vulnerability to distracted pedestrian injury before experiencing the distracted virtual street-crossing and again after 2 weeks and 5 months. Observational assessment of distracted pedestrian behavior was conducted at a busy intersection on the campus as well as at a control campus not exposed to the intervention at baseline, post-intervention, 10 weeks, and 6 months. The intervention achieved mixed results. Individuals exposed to texting within a simulated pedestrian environment reported changes in their intentions to cross streets while distracted and in perceived vulnerability to risk while crossing streets, but we did not witness evidence of changed community norms based on observed rates of distracted pedestrian behavior before and after the intervention compared to a control campus not

Time-series intervention analysis of pedestrian countdown timer effects.

PubMed

Huitema, Bradley E; Van Houten, Ron; Manal, Hana

2014-11-01

Pedestrians account for 40-50% of traffic fatalities in large cities. Several previous studies based on relatively small samples have concluded that Pedestrian Countdown Timers (PCT) may reduce pedestrian crashes at signalized intersections, but other studies report no reduction. The purposes of the present article are to (1) describe a new methodology to evaluate the effectiveness of introducing PCT signals and (2) to present results of applying this methodology to pedestrian crash data collected in a large study carried out in Detroit, Michigan. The study design incorporated within-unit as well as between-unit components. The main focus was on dynamic effects that occurred within the PCT unit of 362 treated sites during the 120 months of the study. An interrupted time-series analysis was developed to evaluate whether change in crash frequency depended upon of the degree to which the countdown timers penetrated the treatment unit. The between-unit component involved comparisons between the treatment unit and a control unit. The overall conclusion is that the introduction of PCT signals in Detroit reduced pedestrian crashes to approximately one-third of the preintervention level. The evidence for this reductionis strong and the change over time was shown to be a function of the extent to which the timers were introduced during the intervention period. There was no general drop-off in crash frequency throughout the baseline interval of over five years; only when the PCT signals were introduced in large numbers was consistent and convincing crash reduction observed. Correspondingly, there was little evidence of change in the control unit. Copyright © 2014. Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Evaluation of pedestrian road traffic maxillofacial injuries in a Nigerian tertiary hospital.

PubMed

Aladelusi, T O; Akinmoladun, I V; Olusanya, O O; Akadiri, O A; Fasola, A O

2014-12-01

Background: Walking is the most basic form of mobility and forms an important part of daily activities; however, walking could often be associated with risks. This is more so when pedestrians share a common space with motorized vehicles especially in developing countries. Despite the frequency of road traffic crashes (RTC) related pedestrian injuries in many developing countries, there is a dearth of documentation of maxillofacial injuries in victims of pedestrian road traffic crashes. The aim of this study was to determine the causes, frequency, pattern, severity, concomitant injuries and outcome of pedestrian maxillofacial injuries observed at a tertiary trauma centre in Nigeria. Pedestrian victims of RTC were prospectively recruited from among all maxillofacial trauma patients seen at the Accident and Emergency department and the Department of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery of the University College Hospital, Ibadan between April 2011 and November 2011. Ethical approval was obtained from the UI/UCH Joint Ethics Review Board before the commencement of the study and informed consent was obtained from participants. Patients' demography, the crash events, types of maxillofacial injuries, and concomitant injuries were recorded. Severity of maxillofacial injury was estimated based on the Maxillofacial Injury Severity Scale (MFISS). Forty-six participants (22.9% of all victims of road traffic crashes seen within the study period) were victims of pedestrian RTC. Pedestrian RTC occurred in all age groups with almost 40% of the victims in their 1st and 2nd decades of life. The most severe MFISS was observed in the 21 - 30 year age group while the least severe injury observed was in the 71 - 80 years age group. Thirty participants (65.2%) were hit by a car or minibus while fourteen (30.4%) were knocked down by a motorcycle. Two (4.4%) were hit by a truck. Soft tissue injury was the most common maxillofacial injury and head injury was the commonest concomitant injury

The flashing right turn signal with pedestrian indication : human factors studies to understand the potential of a new signal to increase awareness of and attention to crossing pedestrians, [summary].

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2015-12-01

The Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) has placed a high priority on understanding : the nature of pedestrian injury and fatality incidents and on developing interventions that will : make Floridas roads safer for pedestrians.

[Accidental hanging during auto-erotic practices].

PubMed

Vieira, D N; da Silva, A G

1989-01-01

An unusual case of accidental hanging during autoerotic practices in a 25-year-old male student is described and the autoerotic asphyxia syndrome briefly discussed. The authors stressed the importance of a correct diagnostic of accidental death in these cases.

A thermostatted kinetic theory model for event-driven pedestrian dynamics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bianca, Carlo; Mogno, Caterina

2018-06-01

This paper is devoted to the modeling of the pedestrian dynamics by means of the thermostatted kinetic theory. Specifically the microscopic interactions among pedestrians and an external force field are modeled for simulating the evacuation of pedestrians from a metro station. The fundamentals of the stochastic game theory and the thermostatted kinetic theory are coupled for the derivation of a specific mathematical model which depicts the time evolution of the distribution of pedestrians at different exits of a metro station. The perturbation theory is employed in order to establish the stability analysis of the nonequilibrium stationary states in the case of a metro station consisting of two exits. A general sensitivity analysis on the initial conditions, the magnitude of the external force field and the number of exits is presented by means of numerical simulations which, in particular, show how the asymptotic distribution and the convergence time are affected by the presence of an external force field. The results show how, in evacuation conditions, the interaction dynamics among pedestrians can be negligible with respect to the external force. The important role of the thermostat term in allowing the reaching of the nonequilibrium stationary state is stressed out. Research perspectives are underlined at the end of paper, in particular for what concerns the derivation of frameworks that take into account the definition of local external actions and the introduction of the space and velocity dynamics.

Pedestrian detection from thermal images: A sparse representation based approach

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Qi, Bin; John, Vijay; Liu, Zheng; Mita, Seiichi

2016-05-01

Pedestrian detection, a key technology in computer vision, plays a paramount role in the applications of advanced driver assistant systems (ADASs) and autonomous vehicles. The objective of pedestrian detection is to identify and locate people in a dynamic environment so that accidents can be avoided. With significant variations introduced by illumination, occlusion, articulated pose, and complex background, pedestrian detection is a challenging task for visual perception. Different from visible images, thermal images are captured and presented with intensity maps based objects' emissivity, and thus have an enhanced spectral range to make human beings perceptible from the cool background. In this study, a sparse representation based approach is proposed for pedestrian detection from thermal images. We first adopted the histogram of sparse code to represent image features and then detect pedestrian with the extracted features in an unimodal and a multimodal framework respectively. In the unimodal framework, two types of dictionaries, i.e. joint dictionary and individual dictionary, are built by learning from prepared training samples. In the multimodal framework, a weighted fusion scheme is proposed to further highlight the contributions from features with higher separability. To validate the proposed approach, experiments were conducted to compare with three widely used features: Haar wavelets (HWs), histogram of oriented gradients (HOG), and histogram of phase congruency (HPC) as well as two classification methods, i.e. AdaBoost and support vector machine (SVM). Experimental results on a publicly available data set demonstrate the superiority of the proposed approach.

A Cellular Automaton model for pedestrian counterflow with swapping

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tao, Y. Z.; Dong, L. Y.

2017-06-01

In this paper, we propose a new floor field Cellular Automaton (CA) model with considering the swapping behaviors of pedestrians. The neighboring pedestrians in opposite directions take swapping in a probability decided by the linear density of pedestrian flow. The swapping which happens simultaneously with the normal movement is introduced to eliminate the gridlock in low density region. Numerical results show that the fundamental diagram is in good agreement with the measured data. Then the model is applied to investigate the counterflow and four typical states such as free flow, lane, intermediate and congestion states are found. More attention is paid on the intermediate state which lane-formation and local congestions switch in an irregular manner. The swapping plays a vital role in reducing the gridlock. Furthermore, the influence of the corridor size and individual's eyesight on counterflow are discussed in detail.

Domain Adaptation for Pedestrian Detection Based on Prediction Consistency

PubMed Central

Huan-ling, Tang; Zhi-yong, An

2014-01-01

Pedestrian detection is an active area of research in computer vision. It remains a quite challenging problem in many applications where many factors cause a mismatch between source dataset used to train the pedestrian detector and samples in the target scene. In this paper, we propose a novel domain adaptation model for merging plentiful source domain samples with scared target domain samples to create a scene-specific pedestrian detector that performs as well as rich target domain simples are present. Our approach combines the boosting-based learning algorithm with an entropy-based transferability, which is derived from the prediction consistency with the source classifications, to selectively choose the samples showing positive transferability in source domains to the target domain. Experimental results show that our approach can improve the detection rate, especially with the insufficient labeled data in target scene. PMID:25013850

High-visibility enforcement on driver compliance with pedestrian right-of-way laws.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2013-08-01

This study developed and evaluated strategies to increase driver yielding to pedestrians on a citywide basis using high-visibility pedestrian right-of-way enforcement. After a site recruitment process, Gainesville, Florida, participated in the projec...

Time-dependent spectral analysis of interactions within groups of walking pedestrians and vertical structural motion using wavelets

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bocian, M.; Brownjohn, J. M. W.; Racic, V.; Hester, D.; Quattrone, A.; Gilbert, L.; Beasley, R.

2018-05-01

A multi-scale and multi-object interaction phenomena can arise when a group of walking pedestrians crosses a structure capable of exhibiting dynamic response. This is because each pedestrian is an autonomous dynamic system capable of displaying intricate behaviour affected by social, psychological, biomechanical and environmental factors, including adaptations to the structural motion. Despite a wealth of mathematical models attempting to describe and simulate coupled crowd-structure system, their applicability can generally be considered uncertain. This can be assigned to a number of assumptions made in their development and the scarcity or unavailability of data suitable for their validation, in particular those associated with pedestrian-pedestrian and pedestrian-structure interaction. To alleviate this problem, data on behaviour of individual pedestrians within groups of six walkers with different spatial arrangements are gathered simultaneously with data on dynamic structural response of a footbridge, from a series of measurements utilising wireless motion monitors. Unlike in previous studies on coordination of pedestrian behaviour, the collected data can serve as a proxy for pedestrian vertical force, which is of critical importance from the point of view of structural stability. A bivariate analysis framework is proposed and applied to these data, encompassing wavelet transform, synchronisation measures based on Shannon entropy and circular statistics. A topological pedestrian map is contrived showing the strength and directionality of between-subjects interactions. It is found that the coordination in pedestrians' vertical force depends on the spatial collocation within a group, but it is generally weak. The relationship between the bridge and pedestrian behaviour is also analysed, revealing stronger propensity for pedestrians to coordinate their force with the structural motion rather than with each other.

A study of fatal pedestrian crashes at rural low-volume road intersections in southwest China.

PubMed

Xie, Xiaoli; Nikitas, Alexandros; Liu, Hongqi

2018-04-03

Although intersections correspond to a small proportion of the entire roadway system, they account for a disproportionally high number of fatal pedestrian crashes, especially on rural roads situated in low- and middle-income countries. This article examines pedestrian safety at rural intersections and suggests applicable accident prevention treatments by providing an in-depth analysis of 28 fatal pedestrian crashes from 8 low-volume roads in southwest China. The driving reliability and error analysis method (DREAM) is a method to support a systematic classification of accident causation information and to facilitate aggregation of that information into patterns of contributing factors. This is the first time that DREAM was used to analyze pedestrian-vehicle crashes and provide suggestions for road improvements in China. The key issues adversely affecting pedestrian safety can be organized in 4 distinctive thematic categories, namely, deficient intersection safety infrastructure, lack of pedestrian safety education, inadequate driver training, and insufficient traffic law enforcement. Given that resources for traffic safety investments in rural areas are limited, it is determined that the potential countermeasures should focus on low-cost, easily implementable, and long-lasting measures increasing the visibility and predictability of pedestrian movement and reducing speeding and irresponsible driving among drivers and risk-taking behaviors among pedestrians. Accident prevention treatments are suggested based on their suitability for rural areas in southwest China. These countermeasures include introducing better access management and traffic calming treatments, providing more opportunities for pedestrian education, and enhancing the quality of driver training and traffic law enforcement.

Potential of pedestrian protection systems--a parameter study using finite element models of pedestrian dummy and generic passenger vehicles.

PubMed

Fredriksson, Rikard; Shin, Jaeho; Untaroiu, Costin D

2011-08-01

To study the potential of active, passive, and integrated (combined active and passive) safety systems in reducing pedestrian upper body loading in typical impact configurations. Finite element simulations using models of generic sedan car fronts and the Polar II pedestrian dummy were performed for 3 impact configurations at 2 impact speeds. Chest contact force, head injury criterion (HIC(15)), head angular acceleration, and the cumulative strain damage measure (CSDM(0.25)) were employed as injury parameters. Further, 3 countermeasures were modeled: an active autonomous braking system, a passive deployable countermeasure, and an integrated system combining the active and passive systems. The auto-brake system was modeled by reducing impact speed by 10 km/h (equivalent to ideal full braking over 0.3 s) and introducing a pitch of 1 degree and in-crash deceleration of 1 g. The deployable system consisted of a deployable hood, lifting 100 mm in the rear, and a lower windshield air bag. All 3 countermeasures showed benefit in a majority of impact configurations in terms of injury prevention. The auto-brake system reduced chest force in a majority of the configurations and decreased HIC(15), head angular acceleration, and CSDM in all configurations. Averaging all impact configurations, the auto-brake system showed reductions of injury predictors from 20 percent (chest force) to 82 percent (HIC). The passive deployable countermeasure reduced chest force and HIC(15) in a majority of configurations and head angular acceleration and CSDM in all configurations, although the CSDM decrease in 2 configurations was minimal. On average a reduction from 20 percent (CSDM) to 58 percent (HIC) was recorded in the passive deployable countermeasures. Finally, the integrated system evaluated in this study reduced all injury assessment parameters in all configurations compared to the reference situations. The average reductions achieved by the integrated system ranged from 56 percent

Pedestrian safety : the identification of precipitating factors and possible countermeasures. Volume 1

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1971-01-01

The study objective was to identify causes and countermeasures relevant to pedestrian. accidents. Behavioral and descriptive data were collected by interviews and on-scene observations for over 2,000 pedestrian accidents in 13 major cities. Subsequen...

Development of Statewide Guidelines for Implementing Leading Pedestrian Intervals in Florida [Summary

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2018-02-01

Pedestrian safety is always a high priority for the Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT), especially as FDOT moves Florida toward a truly multimodal transportation system. Intersections are where vehicles and pedestrians are most likely to int...

The Effects of Acute Sleep Restriction on Adolescents' Pedestrian Safety in a Virtual Environment

PubMed Central

Davis, Aaron L.; Avis, Kristin T.; Schwebel, David C.

2013-01-01

Purpose Over 8,000 American adolescents ages 14-15 require medical attention due to pedestrian injury annually. Cognitive factors contributing to pedestrian safety include reaction time, impulsivity, risk-taking, attention, and decision-making. These characteristics are also influenced by sleep restriction. Experts recommend adolescents obtain 8.5 hours of uninterrupted sleep each night, but most American adolescents do not. Inadequate sleep may place adolescents at risk for pedestrian injury. Method Using a within-subjects design, fifty-five 14- and 15-year-olds engaged in a virtual reality pedestrian environment in two conditions, scheduled a week apart: sleep-restricted (4 hours sleep previous night) and adequate sleep (8.5 hours). Sleep was assessed using actigraphy and pedestrian behavior via four outcome measures: time to initiate crossing, time before contact with vehicle while crossing, virtual hits/close calls and attention to traffic (looks left and right). Results While acutely sleep restricted, adolescents took more time to initiate pedestrian crossings, crossed with less time before contact with vehicles, experienced more virtual hits/close calls and looked left and right more often compared to when adequately rested. Results were maintained after controlling for age, gender, ethnicity and average total sleep duration prior to each condition. Discussion Adolescent pedestrian behavior in the simulated virtual environment was markedly different, and generally more risky, when acutely sleep restricted compared to adequately rested. Inadequate sleep may influence cognitive functioning to the extent that pedestrian safety is jeopardized among adolescents capable of crossing streets safely when rested. Policy decisions might be educated by these results. PMID:24012066

Multilevel models for evaluating the risk of pedestrian-motor vehicle collisions at intersections and mid-blocks.

PubMed

Quistberg, D Alex; Howard, Eric J; Ebel, Beth E; Moudon, Anne V; Saelens, Brian E; Hurvitz, Philip M; Curtin, James E; Rivara, Frederick P

2015-11-01

Walking is a popular form of physical activity associated with clear health benefits. Promoting safe walking for pedestrians requires evaluating the risk of pedestrian-motor vehicle collisions at specific roadway locations in order to identify where road improvements and other interventions may be needed. The objective of this analysis was to estimate the risk of pedestrian collisions at intersections and mid-blocks in Seattle, WA. The study used 2007-2013 pedestrian-motor vehicle collision data from police reports and detailed characteristics of the microenvironment and macroenvironment at intersection and mid-block locations. The primary outcome was the number of pedestrian-motor vehicle collisions over time at each location (incident rate ratio [IRR] and 95% confidence interval [95% CI]). Multilevel mixed effects Poisson models accounted for correlation within and between locations and census blocks over time. Analysis accounted for pedestrian and vehicle activity (e.g., residential density and road classification). In the final multivariable model, intersections with 4 segments or 5 or more segments had higher pedestrian collision rates compared to mid-blocks. Non-residential roads had significantly higher rates than residential roads, with principal arterials having the highest collision rate. The pedestrian collision rate was higher by 9% per 10 feet of street width. Locations with traffic signals had twice the collision rate of locations without a signal and those with marked crosswalks also had a higher rate. Locations with a marked crosswalk also had higher risk of collision. Locations with a one-way road or those with signs encouraging motorists to cede the right-of-way to pedestrians had fewer pedestrian collisions. Collision rates were higher in locations that encourage greater pedestrian activity (more bus use, more fast food restaurants, higher employment, residential, and population densities). Locations with higher intersection density had a lower

Multilevel models for evaluating the risk of pedestrian-motor vehicle collisions at intersections and mid-blocks

PubMed Central

Quistberg, D. Alex; Howard, Eric J.; Ebel, Beth E.; Moudon, Anne V.; Saelens, Brian E.; Hurvitz, Philip M.; Curtin, James E.; Rivara, Frederick P.

2015-01-01

Walking is a popular form of physical activity associated with clear health benefits. Promoting safe walking for pedestrians requires evaluating the risk of pedestrian-motor vehicle collisions at specific roadway locations in order to identify where road improvements and other interventions may be needed. The objective of this analysis was to estimate the risk of pedestrian collisions at intersections and mid-blocks in Seattle, WA. The study used 2007-2013 pedestrian-motor vehicle collision data from police reports and detailed characteristics of the microenvironment and macroenvironment at intersection and mid-block locations. The primary outcome was the number of pedestrian-motor vehicle collisions over time at each location (incident rate ratio [IRR] and 95% confidence interval [95% CI]). Multilevel mixed effects Poisson models accounted for correlation within and between locations and census blocks over time. Analysis accounted for pedestrian and vehicle activity (e.g., residential density and road classification). In the final multivariable model, intersections with 4 segments or 5 or more segments had higher pedestrian collision rates compared to mid-blocks. Non-residential roads had significantly higher rates than residential roads, with principal arterials having the highest collision rate. The pedestrian collision rate was higher by 9% per 10 feet of street width. Locations with traffic signals had twice the collision rate of locations without a signal and those with marked crosswalks also had a higher rate. Locations with a marked crosswalk also had higher risk of collision. Locations with a one-way road or those with signs encouraging motorists to cede the right-of-way to pedestrians had fewer pedestrian collisions. Collision rates were higher in locations that encourage greater pedestrian activity (more bus use, more fast food restaurants, higher employment, residential, and population densities). Locations with higher intersection density had a lower

The effect of road and environmental characteristics on pedestrian hit-and-run accidents in Ghana.

PubMed

Aidoo, Eric Nimako; Amoh-Gyimah, Richard; Ackaah, Williams

2013-04-01

The number of pedestrians who have died as a result of being hit by vehicles has increased in recent years, in addition to vehicle passenger deaths. Many pedestrians who were involved in road traffic accident died as a result of the driver leaving the pedestrian who was struck unattended at the scene of the accident. This paper seeks to determine the effect of road and environmental characteristics on pedestrian hit-and-run accidents in Ghana. Using pedestrian accident data extracted from the National Road Traffic Accident Database at the Building and Road Research Institute (BRRI) of the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), Ghana, a binary logit model was employed in the analysis. The results from the estimated model indicate that fatal accidents, unclear weather, nighttime conditions, and straight and flat road sections without medians and junctions significantly increase the likelihood that the vehicle driver will leave the scene after hitting a pedestrian. Thus, integrating median separation and speed humps into road design and construction and installing street lights will help to curb the problem of pedestrian hit-and-run accidents in Ghana. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Video-processing-based system for automated pedestrian data collection and analysis when crossing the street

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Mansouri, Nabila; Watelain, Eric; Ben Jemaa, Yousra; Motamed, Cina

2018-03-01

Computer-vision techniques for pedestrian detection and tracking have progressed considerably and become widely used in several applications. However, a quick glance at the literature shows a minimal use of these techniques in pedestrian behavior and safety analysis, which might be due to the technical complexities facing the processing of pedestrian videos. To extract pedestrian trajectories from a video automatically, all road users must be detected and tracked during sequences, which is a challenging task, especially in a congested open-outdoor urban space. A multipedestrian tracker based on an interframe-detection-association process was proposed and evaluated. The tracker results are used to implement an automatic tool for pedestrians data collection when crossing the street based on video processing. The variations in the instantaneous speed allowed the detection of the street crossing phases (approach, waiting, and crossing). These were addressed for the first time in the pedestrian road security analysis to illustrate the causal relationship between pedestrian behaviors in the different phases. A comparison with a manual data collection method, by computing the root mean square error and the Pearson correlation coefficient, confirmed that the procedures proposed have significant potential to automate the data collection process.

Experimental field test of proposed pedestrian safety messages. Volume 2, Child messages

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1983-11-01

Author's abstract: A detailed re-analysis of available pedestrian accident data was utilized to define three sets of pedestrian safety public information and education (PI&E) messages. These messages were then produced and field tested. The objective...

Defining and quantifying state of good repair (SGR) for the pedestrian network.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2015-02-01

State of Good Repair is difficult to quantify in a pedestrian context. Dozens and dozens of : variables can affect the utility of the pedestrian network, and these variables change depending : upon the environmental context (urban, suburban, rural). ...

Pedestrian injuries due to collisions with bicycles in New York and California.

PubMed

Tuckel, Peter; Milczarski, William; Maisel, Richard

2014-12-01

Scant attention has been given to pedestrians injured in accidents resulting from collisions with cyclists. This scholarly neglect is surprising given the growing popularity of cycling. This study examines the incidence of pedestrians injured by cyclists in New York between 2004 to 2011 and in California from 2005 to 2011. The study also profiles the pedestrians injured in these two states during these two time frames. The data for this study are based upon patient-level hospital records from New York and California. The data for New York comes from the Statewide Planning and Research Cooperative System (SPARCS) under the auspices of New York State's Department of Health. The data for California come from two sources: the Healthcare Cost and Utilization Project (HCUP) and the California Office of Statewide Health Planning and Development. The rate of pedestrians injured in collisions with cyclists has decreased over time. This decline has occurred despite the increase in the number of cyclists in these states during this same time period. Two possible explanations for this decline are: (a) less exposure of children to cyclists, and (b) improvements in the cycling infrastructure. Although the rate of injuries to pedestrians from collisions with cyclists has been decreasing, improvements to the cycling infrastructure will need to continue. Bike lanes, particularly protected bike lanes, have been shown to be an effective way of reducing cycling-pedestrian accidents. The results of the current study are consistent with this research. Educational campaigns aimed at cyclists that emphasize the safety of all road users--including pedestrians--will also need to continue to assure that this downward trend in the number of accidents is not reversed. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Access to pedestrian roads, daily activities, and physical performance of adolescents.

PubMed

Sjolie, A N

2000-08-01

A cross-sectional study using a questionnaire and physical tests was performed. To study how access to pedestrian roads and daily activities are related to low back strength, low back mobility, and hip mobility in adolescents. Although many authorities express concern about the passive lifestyle of adolescents, little is known about associations between daily activities and physical performance. This study compared 38 youths in a community lacking access to pedestrian roads with 50 youths in nearby area providing excellent access to pedestrian roads. A standardized questionnaire was used to obtain data about pedestrian roads, school journeys, and activities from the local authorities and the pupils. Low back strength was tested as static endurance strength, low back mobility by modified Schober techniques, and hip mobility by goniometer. For statistical analyses, a P value of 0.05 or less determined significance. In the area using school buses, the pupils had less low back extension, less hamstring flexibility, and less hip abduction, flexion, and extension than pupils in the area with pedestrian roads. Multivariate analyses showed no associations between walking or bicycling to school and anatomic function, but regular walking or bicycling to leisure-time activities associated positively with low back strength, low back extension, hip flexion, and extension. Distance by school bus associated negatively with hip abduction, hip flexion, hip extension, and hamstring flexibility (P<0.001). Time spent on television or computer associated negatively but insignificantly with low back strength, hamstring flexibility, hip abduction, and flexion (P<0.1). The results indicate that access to pedestrian roads and other lifestyle factors are associated with physical performance.

Metropolitan pedestrian and bicycle planning handbook

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2017-02-01

The purpose of this handbook is to provide Metropolitan Planning Organizations (MPOs) with practical information and examples, as they consider pedestrian and bicycle transportation in their regional planning activities. Based on research including i...

Effect of gate skirts on pedestrian behavior at highway-rail grade crossings

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2013-12-31

The Federal Railroad Administration was interested in evaluating one type of pedestrian safety device, commonly known as gate skirts, that consists of a secondary horizontal hanging gate under the existing pedestrian gate to better block access to th...

Pedestrian simulation and distribution in urban space based on visibility analysis and agent simulation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ying, Shen; Li, Lin; Gao, Yurong

2009-10-01

Spatial visibility analysis is the important direction of pedestrian behaviors because our visual conception in space is the straight method to get environment information and navigate your actions. Based on the agent modeling and up-tobottom method, the paper develop the framework about the analysis of the pedestrian flow depended on visibility. We use viewshed in visibility analysis and impose the parameters on agent simulation to direct their motion in urban space. We analyze the pedestrian behaviors in micro-scale and macro-scale of urban open space. The individual agent use visual affordance to determine his direction of motion in micro-scale urban street on district. And we compare the distribution of pedestrian flow with configuration in macro-scale urban environment, and mine the relationship between the pedestrian flow and distribution of urban facilities and urban function. The paper first computes the visibility situations at the vantage point in urban open space, such as street network, quantify the visibility parameters. The multiple agents use visibility parameters to decide their direction of motion, and finally pedestrian flow reach to a stable state in urban environment through the simulation of multiple agent system. The paper compare the morphology of visibility parameters and pedestrian distribution with urban function and facilities layout to confirm the consistence between them, which can be used to make decision support in urban design.

Robust and fast pedestrian detection method for far-infrared automotive driving assistance systems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Liu, Qiong; Zhuang, Jiajun; Ma, Jun

2013-09-01

Despite considerable effort has been contributed to night-time pedestrian detection for automotive driving assistance systems recent years, robust and real-time pedestrian detection is by no means a trivial task and is still underway due to the moving cameras, uncontrolled outdoor environments, wide range of possible pedestrian presentations and the stringent performance criteria for automotive applications. This paper presents an alternative night-time pedestrian detection method using monocular far-infrared (FIR) camera, which includes two modules (regions of interest (ROIs) generation and pedestrian recognition) in a cascade fashion. Pixel-gradient oriented vertical projection is first proposed to estimate the vertical image stripes that might contain pedestrians, and then local thresholding image segmentation is adopted to generate ROIs more accurately within the estimated vertical stripes. A novel descriptor called PEWHOG (pyramid entropy weighted histograms of oriented gradients) is proposed to represent FIR pedestrians in recognition module. Specifically, PEWHOG is used to capture both the local object shape described by the entropy weighted distribution of oriented gradient histograms and its pyramid spatial layout. Then PEWHOG is fed to a three-branch structured classifier using support vector machines (SVM) with histogram intersection kernel (HIK). An off-line training procedure combining both the bootstrapping and early-stopping strategy is introduced to generate a more robust classifier by exploiting hard negative samples iteratively. Finally, multi-frame validation is utilized to suppress some transient false positives. Experimental results on FIR video sequences from various scenarios demonstrate that the presented method is effective and promising.

Expanding pedestrian injury risk to the body region level: how to model passive safety systems in pedestrian injury risk functions.

PubMed

Niebuhr, Tobias; Junge, Mirko; Achmus, Stefanie

2015-01-01

Assessment of the effectiveness of advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) plays a crucial role in accident research. A common way to evaluate the effectiveness of new systems is to determine the potentials for injury severity reduction. Because injury risk functions describe the probability of an injury of a given severity conditional on a technical accident severity (closing speed, delta V, barrier equivalent speed, etc.), they are predestined for such evaluations. Recent work has stated an approach on how to model the pedestrian injury risk in pedestrian-to-passenger car accidents as a family of functions. This approach gave explicit and easily interpretable formulae for the injury risk conditional on the closing speed of the car. These results are extended to injury risk functions for pedestrian body regions. Starting with a double-checked German In-depth Accident Study (GIDAS) pedestrian-to-car accident data set (N = 444) and a functional-anatomical definition of the body regions, investigations on the influence of specific body regions on the overall injury severity will be presented. As the measure of injury severity, the ISSx, a rescaled version of the well-known Injury Severity Score (ISS), was used. Though traditional ISS is computed by summation of the squares of the 3 most severe injured body regions, ISSx is computed by the summation of the exponentials of the Abbreviated Injury Scale (AIS) severities of the 3 most severely injured body regions. The exponentials used are scaled to fit the ISS range of values between 0 and 75. Three body regions (head/face/neck, thorax, hip/legs) clearly dominated abdominal and upper extremity injuries; that is, the latter 2 body regions had no influence at all on the overall injury risk over the range of technical accident severities. Thus, the ISSx is well described by use of the injury codes from the same body regions for any pedestrian injury severity. As a mathematical consequence, the ISSx becomes explicitly

The Advocacy for Pedestrian Safety Study: Cluster Randomised Trial Evaluating a Political Advocacy Approach to Reduce Pedestrian Injuries in Deprived Communities

PubMed Central

Lyons, Ronan A.; Kendrick, Denise; Towner, Elizabeth M. L.; Coupland, Carol; Hayes, Mike; Christie, Nicola; Sleney, Judith; Jones, Sarah; Kimberlee, Richard; Rodgers, Sarah E.; Turner, Samantha; Brussoni, Mariana; Vinogradova, Yana; Sarvotham, Tinnu; Macey, Steven

2013-01-01

Objective To determine whether advocacy targeted at local politicians leads to action to reduce the risk of pedestrian injury in deprived areas. Design Cluster randomised controlled trial. Setting 239 electoral wards in 57 local authorities in England and Wales. Participants 617 elected local politicians. Interventions Intervention group politicians were provided with tailored information packs, including maps of casualty sites, numbers injured and a synopsis of effective interventions. Main outcome measures 25–30 months post intervention, primary outcomes included: electoral ward level: percentage of road traffic calmed; proportion with new interventions; school level: percentage with 20 mph zones, Safe Routes to School, pedestrian training or road safety education; politician level: percentage lobbying for safety measures. Secondary outcomes included politicians’ interest and involvement in injury prevention, and facilitators and barriers to implementation. Results Primary outcomes did not significantly differ: % difference in traffic calming (0.07, 95%CI: −0.07 to 0.20); proportion of schools with 20 mph zones (RR 1.47, 95%CI: 0.93 to 2.32), Safe Routes to School (RR 1.34, 95%CI: 0.83 to 2.17), pedestrian training (RR 1.23, 95%CI: 0.95 to 1.61) or other safety education (RR 1.16, 95%CI: 0.97 to 1.39). Intervention group politicians reported greater interest in child injury prevention (RR 1.09, 95%CI 1.03 to 1.16), belief in potential to help prevent injuries (RR 1.36, 95%CI 1.16 to 1.61), particularly pedestrian safety (RR 1.55, 95%CI 1.19 to 2.03). 63% of intervention politicians reported supporting new pedestrian safety schemes. The majority found the advocacy information surprising, interesting, effectively presented, and could identify suitable local interventions. Conclusions This study demonstrates the feasibility of an innovative approach to translational public health by targeting local politicians in a randomised controlled trial. The intervention

[THREE CASES OF ACCIDENTAL AUTO-INJECTION OF ADRENALINE].

PubMed

Yanagida, Noriyuki; Iikura, Katsuhito; Ogura, Kiyotake; Wang, Ling-jen; Asaumi, Tomoyuki; Sato, Sakura; Ebisawa, Motohiro

2015-12-01

Reports on accidental auto-injection of adrenaline are few. We encountered three cases of accidental injection of adrenaline. In this study, we have examined and reported the clinical courses and symptoms of our cases. CASE 1 involved a female physician in her 50s who had attended an explanatory meeting on auto-injection of adrenaline. She mistook EpiPen® to be the EpiPen trainer and accidentally injected herself with 0.3 mg EpiPen®. Her systolic/diastolic pressure peaked at 7 min to reach 144/78 mmHg and decreased to 120/77 mmHg at 14 min. Except for palpitation after 7 min, the only subjective symptom was local pain at the injection site. CASE 2 was noted in a 6-year-old boy. He accidentally pierced his right forefinger with 0.15 mg EpiPen®, and after 20 min, his right forefinger was swollen. The swelling improved 80 min after the accidental injection. CASE 3 was noted in a 4-year-old girl. She accidentally injected herself with 0.15 mg EpiPen®. Her systolic/diastolic pressure peaked at 23 min to reach 123/70 mmHg and decreased to 96/86 mmHg at 28 min. Severe adverse effects of accidental auto-injection of adrenaline were not observed in these three cases. Our findings suggest that while handling adrenaline auto-injectors, we should keep in mind the possibility of accidental injection.

Recognizing pedestrian's unsafe behaviors in far-infrared imagery at night

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lee, Eun Ju; Ko, Byoung Chul; Nam, Jae-Yeal

2016-05-01

Pedestrian behavior recognition is important work for early accident prevention in advanced driver assistance system (ADAS). In particular, because most pedestrian-vehicle crashes are occurred from late of night to early of dawn, our study focus on recognizing unsafe behavior of pedestrians using thermal image captured from moving vehicle at night. For recognizing unsafe behavior, this study uses convolutional neural network (CNN) which shows high quality of recognition performance. However, because traditional CNN requires the very expensive training time and memory, we design the light CNN consisted of two convolutional layers and two subsampling layers for real-time processing of vehicle applications. In addition, we combine light CNN with boosted random forest (Boosted RF) classifier so that the output of CNN is not fully connected with the classifier but randomly connected with Boosted random forest. We named this CNN as randomly connected CNN (RC-CNN). The proposed method was successfully applied to the pedestrian unsafe behavior (PUB) dataset captured from far-infrared camera at night and its behavior recognition accuracy is confirmed to be higher than that of some algorithms related to CNNs, with a shorter processing time.

Pedestrian worker fatalities in workplace locations, Australia, 2000-2010.

PubMed

Kitching, Fiona; Jones, Christopher B; Ibrahim, Joseph E; Ozanne-Smith, Joan

2014-01-01

Pedestrian deaths of workers in Australian workplaces (1 July 2000-31 December 2010) are described using coronial and safety authority fatality databases. One hundred and fifteen deaths were identified, with the majority male (93%) and aged over 50 years (59%). Four industries predominated (85% of deaths): Agriculture, Forestry and Fishing (31%), Construction (29%), Transport, Postal and Warehousing (16%) and Manufacturing (10%). Similarly, three occupations dominated: Farmers (28%), Labourers (27%) and Machinery Operators and Drivers (25%). Common circumstantial factors (reversing machines or vehicles, driver also the pedestrian, driver's vision impeded and working accompanied) occurred in the Construction, Transport and Manufacturing industries, providing collaborative opportunities for prevention. Deaths occurring in the Agriculture industry showed different circumstantial factors, likely needing different solutions. While some effective countermeasures are known, workplace pedestrian fatalities continue to occur. Prevention strategies are needed to share known information across industries and to produce data enhancements and new knowledge.

Pedestrian traffic injuries among school children in Kawempe, Uganda.

PubMed

Nakitto, Mable T; Mutto, Milton; Howard, Andrew; Lett, Ronald

2008-09-01

Traffic injuries are an important problem in low income countries. In Uganda road traffic is the largest single cause of injury in Kampala; pedestrians, and children are most affected. Pedestrian injury affects school children in Uganda. To determine the overall risk of pedestrian traffic injury among school children in Kawempe, Uganda. A cohort was assembled at 35 primary schools and followed for 3 terms. Ten of the schools had participated in previous injury programs, others were systematically selected. Injuries were recorded by teachers using a questionnaire. Data collected included ID, school, age, grade, gender, incident date, vehicle type, and injury outcome. Demographic characteristics are described and cumulative incidences calculated. The cohort included 8,165 children (49% male) from 35 primary schools. The mean age was 9 years (Sd=2.78). Of the 35 schools, 92% were day; the others mixed day and boarding. 53 children (27 girls) were involved in a traffic incident. 25% of the injuries reported were serious and warranted care in a health facility. No deaths occurred. Forty % of incidents involved commercial motorcycles, 41% bicycles, 9% cars, 8% taxis, and 2% trucks. The cumulative incidence was 0.168% each term. Over the 3 terms of the year the cumulative incidence was 0.5 +/- 0.02. There were no gender differences in the cumulative incidence. Each school year about 1/2 % of Kawempe school children are involved in a traffic incident. Interventions are necessary to reduce the unacceptably high incidents of pedestrian traffic. Interventions to alleviate this situation including safer routes, teaching skills of road crossing to children as well as better regulation and road safety education to two wheelers could reduce the unacceptably high incidents of pedestrian traffic injury.

Pedestrian hybrid beacon crosswalk system (PHB) or high-intensity activated crosswalk (HAWK).

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2014-11-01

The Pedestrian Hybrid Beacon Crosswalk (PHB) is a type of traffic control system, used to aid : pedestrians safely crossing the street and to regulate traffic flow. This study examines the : success of the first PHB installed in the state of Vermont....

Gainesville, Florida increases pedestrian safety by implementing year-long program : traffic tech.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2013-08-01

In large cities, pedestrians account for 40% to 50% of traffic : fatalities. In 2011, there were 4,432 pedestrian fatalities : and about 69,000 injuries in the United States (NHTSA, : 2013). Many of these incidents occur at crosswalks where : drivers...

Pedestrians' perceptions of walkability and safety in relation to the built environment in Cali, Colombia, 2009-10.

PubMed

Villaveces, Andrés; Nieto, Luis Alfonso; Ortega, Delia; Ríos, José Fernando; Medina, John Jairo; Gutiérrez, María Isabel; Rodríguez, Daniel

2012-10-01

To assess pedestrians' perceptions of the walkability of the urban environment and pedestrian safety in Cali, Colombia. Standardised intercept interviews were conducted of 400 pedestrians walking in 20 randomly selected urban zones to ascertain frequency of walking, and perceptions of safety, the built environment and security. Four focus group meetings were held with community members and students addressing these issues in an open-ended forum. The study analysed quantitative data collected in street interviews and qualitative information from focus groups addressing respondents' views on problems for pedestrians, how the built environment affects walking and ideal walking conditions. Access to public transportation was deemed the most positive characteristic of the built environment and 61% of respondents liked walking in the street. When disaggregating street conditions, the majority of pedestrians were dissatisfied with their walking experiences. Pedestrians cited lack of respect for norms, personal safety and built environment characteristics as their main concerns. Among frequent walkers, residents tended to rate their neighbourhoods more negatively compared with non-residents. Through qualitative interviews it became apparent that narrow sidewalks that are frequently obstructed by motor vehicles are a key reason for pedestrian dissatisfaction. A perception of overall insecurity further determines how pedestrians assess or modulate their walking in this city. Overall, walking in Cali was perceived negatively by pedestrians because of built environment characteristics and perceptions of insecurity. Qualitative information used to complement intercept surveys can provide a better way to identify pedestrian-specific transport-related problems.

Urban sprawl as a risk factor in motor vehicle occupant and pedestrian fatalities.

PubMed

Ewing, Reid; Schieber, Richard A; Zegeer, Charles V

2003-09-01

We sought to determine the association between urban sprawl and traffic fatalities. We created a sprawl index by applying principal components analysis to data for 448 US counties in the largest 101 metropolitan areas. Regression analysis was used to determine associations between the index and traffic fatalities. For every 1% increase in the index (i.e., more compact, less sprawl), all-mode traffic fatality rates fell by 1.49% (P <.001) and pedestrian fatality rates fell by 1.47% to 3.56%, after adjustment for pedestrian exposure (P <.001). Urban sprawl was directly related to traffic fatalities and pedestrian fatalities. Subsequent studies should investigate relationships at a finer geographic scale and should strive to improve on the measure of exposure used to adjust pedestrian fatality rates.

The effects of acute sleep restriction on adolescents' pedestrian safety in a virtual environment.

PubMed

Davis, Aaron L; Avis, Kristin T; Schwebel, David C

2013-12-01

Over 8,000 American adolescents ages 14-15 years require medical attention owing to pedestrian injury annually. Cognitive factors contributing to pedestrian safety include reaction time, impulsivity, risk taking, attention, and decision making. These characteristics are also influenced by sleep restriction. Experts recommend that adolescents obtain 8.5 hours of uninterrupted sleep each night, but most American adolescents do not. Inadequate sleep may place adolescents at risk for pedestrian injury. Using a within-subjects design, 55 14- and 15-year-olds engaged in a virtual reality pedestrian environment under two conditions, scheduled a week apart: sleep-restricted (4 hours' sleep the previous night) and adequate sleep (8.5 hours). Sleep was assessed using actigraphy and pedestrian behavior via four outcome measures: time to initiate crossing, time before contact with vehicle while crossing, virtual hits or close calls and attention to traffic (looks left and right). While acutely sleep restricted, adolescents took more time to initiate pedestrian crossings, crossed with less time before contact with vehicles, experienced more virtual hits or close calls, and looked left and right more often compared with when adequately rested. Results were maintained after controlling for age, gender, ethnicity, and average total sleep duration before each condition. Adolescent pedestrian behavior in the simulated virtual environment was markedly different, and generally more risky, when acutely sleep restricted compared with adequately rested. Inadequate sleep may influence cognitive functioning to the extent that pedestrian safety is jeopardized among adolescents capable of crossing streets safely when rested. Policy decisions might be educated by these results. Copyright © 2013 Society for Adolescent Health and Medicine. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Image-Based Localization Aided Indoor Pedestrian Trajectory Estimation Using Smartphones

PubMed Central

Zhou, Yan; Zheng, Xianwei; Chen, Ruizhi; Xiong, Hanjiang; Guo, Sheng

2018-01-01

Accurately determining pedestrian location in indoor environments using consumer smartphones is a significant step in the development of ubiquitous localization services. Many different map-matching methods have been combined with pedestrian dead reckoning (PDR) to achieve low-cost and bias-free pedestrian tracking. However, this works only in areas with dense map constraints and the error accumulates in open areas. In order to achieve reliable localization without map constraints, an improved image-based localization aided pedestrian trajectory estimation method is proposed in this paper. The image-based localization recovers the pose of the camera from the 2D-3D correspondences between the 2D image positions and the 3D points of the scene model, previously reconstructed by a structure-from-motion (SfM) pipeline. This enables us to determine the initial location and eliminate the accumulative error of PDR when an image is successfully registered. However, the image is not always registered since the traditional 2D-to-3D matching rejects more and more correct matches when the scene becomes large. We thus adopt a robust image registration strategy that recovers initially unregistered images by integrating 3D-to-2D search. In the process, the visibility and co-visibility information is adopted to improve the efficiency when searching for the correspondences from both sides. The performance of the proposed method was evaluated through several experiments and the results demonstrate that it can offer highly acceptable pedestrian localization results in long-term tracking, with an error of only 0.56 m, without the need for dedicated infrastructures. PMID:29342123

A Methodology for the Geometric Standardization of Vehicle Hoods to Compare Real-World Pedestrian Crashes

PubMed Central

Koetje, Bethany D.; Grabowski, Jurek G.

2008-01-01

This paper describes a standardization method that allows injury researchers to directly compare pedestrian hood contact points across a variety of hood sizes and geometries. To standardize hood contact locations a new coordinate system was created at the geometric center of the hood. Standardizing hood contact locations was done by turning each coordinate location into a ratio of the entire length or width of the hood. The standardized pedestrian contact locations could then be compared for various hood sizes. The standardized hood was divided into a three-by-three grid to aggregate contact points into hood regions. Data was obtained from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s Pedestrian Crash Data Study from 1994 to 1998. To understand injury severity with respect to pedestrian hood contact location, the injuries were narrowed to the single most severe Abreviated Injury Scale injury to the pedestrian and hood location at which that injury was sustained. Of the 97 pedestrian/vehicle cases, pedestrians received 270 injuries from 141 unique hood contact locations. After standardization, 36%, 28%, 36% of all contact points were located on the left, center and right side of the hood respectively. Vertically, 26%, 45%, 28% of contacts occurred at the front, middle, and rear regions of the hood respectively. The middle passenger side of the hood contained the most number of AIS 3+ injuries. By using real-world crash data, engineers can make evidence based decisions to decease the severity of pedestrian injuries. PMID:19026236

Dynamic compositional modeling of pedestrian crash counts on urban roads in Connecticut.

PubMed

Serhiyenko, Volodymyr; Ivan, John N; Ravishanker, Nalini; Islam, Md Saidul

2014-03-01

Uncovering the temporal trend in crash counts provides a good understanding of the context for pedestrian safety. With a rareness of pedestrian crashes it is impossible to investigate monthly temporal effects with an individual segment/intersection level data, thus the time dependence should be derived from the aggregated level data. Most previous studies have used annual data to investigate the differences in pedestrian crashes between different regions or countries in a given year, and/or to look at time trends of fatal pedestrian injuries annually. Use of annual data unfortunately does not provide sufficient information on patterns in time trends or seasonal effects. This paper describes statistical methods uncovering patterns in monthly pedestrian crashes aggregated on urban roads in Connecticut from January 1995 to December 2009. We investigate the temporal behavior of injury severity levels, including fatal (K), severe injury (A), evident minor injury (B), and non-evident possible injury and property damage only (C and O), as proportions of all pedestrian crashes in each month, taking into consideration effects of time trend, seasonal variations and VMT (vehicle miles traveled). This type of dependent multivariate data is characterized by positive components which sum to one, and occurs in several applications in science and engineering. We describe a dynamic framework with vector autoregressions (VAR) for modeling and predicting compositional time series. Combining these predictions with predictions from a univariate statistical model for total crash counts will then enable us to predict pedestrian crash counts with the different injury severity levels. We compare these predictions with those obtained from fitting separate univariate models to time series of crash counts at each injury severity level. We also show that the dynamic models perform better than the corresponding static models. We implement the Integrated Nested Laplace Approximation (INLA

Informing a pedestrian safety improvement program.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2009-01-01

Caltrans is scoping the development of a Pedestrian Safety Improvement Program (PSIP). In its mission, organization or implementation, such a program might be analogous to the agencys existing Highway Safety Improvement Program (HSIP). The HSIP (s...

Issues and challenges for pedestrian active safety systems based on real world accidents.

PubMed

Hamdane, Hédi; Serre, Thierry; Masson, Catherine; Anderson, Robert

2015-09-01

The purpose of this study was to analyze real crashes involving pedestrians in order to evaluate the potential effectiveness of autonomous emergency braking systems (AEB) in pedestrian protection. A sample of 100 real accident cases were reconstructed providing a comprehensive set of data describing the interaction between the vehicle, the environment and the pedestrian all along the scenario of the accident. A generic AEB system based on a camera sensor for pedestrian detection was modeled in order to identify the functionality of its different attributes in the timeline of each crash scenario. These attributes were assessed to determine their impact on pedestrian safety. The influence of the detection and the activation of the AEB system were explored by varying the field of view (FOV) of the sensor and the level of deceleration. A FOV of 35° was estimated to be required to detect and react to the majority of crash scenarios. For the reaction of a system (from hazard detection to triggering the brakes), between 0.5 and 1s appears necessary. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Impact of improving vehicle front design on the burden of pedestrian injuries in Germany, the United States, and India.

PubMed

Moran, Dane; Bose, Dipan; Bhalla, Kavi

2017-11-17

European car design regulations and New Car Assessment Program (NCAP) ratings have led to reductions in pedestrian injuries. The aim of this study was to evaluate the impact of improving vehicle front design on mortality and morbidity due to pedestrian injuries in a European country (Germany) and 2 countries (the United States and India) that do not have pedestrian-focused NCAP testing or design regulations. We used data from the International Road Traffic and Accident Database and the Global Burden of Disease project to estimate baseline pedestrian deaths and nonfatal injuries in each country in 2013. The effect of improved passenger car star ratings on probability of pedestrian injury was based on recent evaluations of pedestrian crash data from Germany. The effect of improved heavy motor vehicle (HMV) front end design on pedestrian injuries was based on estimates reported by simulation studies. We used burden of disease methods to estimate population health loss by combining the burden of morbidity and mortality in disability-adjusted life years (DALYs) lost. Extrapolating from evaluations in Germany suggests that improving front end design of cars can potentially reduce the burden of pedestrian injuries due to cars by up to 24% in the United States and 41% in India. In Germany, where cars comply with the United Nations regulation on pedestrian safety, additional improvements would have led to a 1% reduction. Similarly, improved HMV design would reduce DALYs lost by pedestrian victims hit by HMVs by 20% in each country. Overall, improved vehicle design would reduce DALYs lost to road traffic injuries (RTIs) by 0.8% in Germany, 4.1% in the United States, and 6.7% in India. Recent evaluations show a strong correlation between Euro NCAP pedestrian scores and real-life pedestrian injuries, suggesting that improved car front end design in Europe has led to substantial reductions in pedestrian injuries. Although the United States has fewer pedestrian crashes, it would

Statewide pedestrian and bicycle planning handbook

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2014-09-01

This handbook is designed to help State departments of transportation (DOTs) develop or update State pedestrian and bicycle plans. Based on research including interviews with nine State DOTs and critical evaluations of documents from 15 States, this ...

Autonomous pedestrian localization technique using CMOS camera sensors

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chun, Chanwoo

2014-09-01

We present a pedestrian localization technique that does not need infrastructure. The proposed angle-only measurement method needs specially manufactured shoes. Each shoe has two CMOS cameras and two markers such as LEDs attached on the inward side. The line of sight (LOS) angles towards the two markers on the forward shoe are measured using the two cameras on the other rear shoe. Our simulation results shows that a pedestrian walking down in a shopping mall wearing this device can be accurately guided to the front of a destination store located 100m away, if the floor plan of the mall is available.

Obstructive Sleep Apnea Syndrome (OSAS) Increases Pedestrian Injury Risk in Children

PubMed Central

Avis, Kristin T.; Gamble, Karen L.; Schwebel, David C

2014-01-01

Objectives To evaluate pedestrian behavior, including reaction time, impulsivity, risk-taking, attention, and decision-making, in children with obstructive sleep apnea syndrome (OSAS) compared with healthy controls. Study design Using a case control design, sixty 8- to 16-year-olds with newly diagnosed and untreated OSAS engaged in a virtual reality pedestrian environment. Sixty-one healthy children matched using a yoke-control procedure by age, race, gender and household income served as controls. Results Children with OSAS were riskier pedestrians than healthy children of the same age, race, and sex. Children with OSAS waited less time to cross (p<.01). The groups did not differ in looking at oncoming traffic or taking longer to decide to cross. Conclusions Results suggest OSAS may have significant consequences on children’s daytime functioning in a critical domain of personal safety, pedestrian skills. Children with OSAS appeared to have greater impulsivity when crossing streets. Results highlight the need for heightened awareness of the consequences of untreated sleep disorders and identify a possible target for pediatric injury prevention. PMID:25444002

Personal injury recovery cost of pedestrian-vehicle collisions in New South Wales, Australia.

PubMed

Mitchell, Rebecca J; Bambach, Mike R

2016-07-03

There is a need for routine estimates of injury recovery costs from pedestrian collisions using hospital separation records for economic evaluations. To estimate the cost of injury recovery following pedestrian-vehicle collisions using the personal injury recover cost (PIRC) equation using key demographic and injury characteristics. An estimation of the costs of on-road pedestrian-vehicle collisions involving individuals who were injured and hospitalized in New South Wales (NSW), Australia, from 2002 to 2011 using the PIRC equation. The PIRC estimates individual injury recovery costs and does not include costs associated with property damage, vehicle repair, or rescue services. Individual recovery costs associated with severe traumatic brain injury (TBI) were estimated. The injured individual's mean, median, and total injury recovery costs are described for key demographic, injury, and crash characteristics. There were 9,781 pedestrians who were injured, costing an estimated total of $2.4 billion in personal injury recovery costs, an annual cost of $243 million. Males had a total injury recovery cost 1.7 times higher than females. The median injury recovery cost decreased with increasing age. TBI ($248,491) and spinal cord and vertebral column injuries ($264,103) had the highest median injury recovery costs for the body region of the most severe injury. TBI accounted for 22.6% of the total injury recovery costs for the most severe injury sustained. Just over one third of pedestrians sustained 4 or more injuries, with a median cost of $243,992, which was 1.6 times higher than the cost for a pedestrian who sustained a single injury ($153,682). Personal injury recovery costs following pedestrian-vehicle collisions where a pedestrian is injured are substantial in NSW. The PIRC equation enables the economic cost burden of road traffic injury to be calculated using hospital separation data. The PIRC enables comprehensive personal injury recovery costs to be estimated

Literature review on the preschool pedestrian

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1984-10-01

The purpose of this literature review was to describe (1) the factors leading to typical preschool pedestrian accidents, (2) the developmental characteristics of the preschool child that affect his/her behavior in traffic, (3) social factors that may...

Literature review on the preschool pedestrian

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1985-01-01

The purpose of this literature review was to describe (1) the factors leading to typical preschool pedestrian accidents, (2) the developmental characteristics of the preschool child that affect his/her behavior in traffic, (3) social factors that may...

Evaluation of alternative pedestrian control devices.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2012-03-01

A literature review, field study of Rectangular Rapid Flashing Beacon (RRFB) installations in Oregon, and a static survey : on the sequencing of the Pedestrian Hybrid Beacon (PHB) were completed. : The field study conducted in this project was design...

Effect of Aspiration and Mean Gain on the Emergence of Cooperation in Unidirectional Pedestrian Flow

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wang, Zi-Yang; Ma, Jian; Zhao, Hui; Qin, Yong; Zhu, Wei; Jia, Li-Min

2013-03-01

When more than one pedestrian want to move to the same site, conflicts appear and thus the involved pedestrians play a motion game. In order to describe the emergence of cooperation during the conflict resolving process, an evolutionary cellular automation model is established considering the effect of aspiration and mean gain. In each game, pedestrian may be gentle cooperator or aggressive defector. We propose a set of win-stay-lose-shrift (WSLS) like rules for updating pedestrian's strategy. These rules prescribe that if the mean gain of current strategy between some given steps is larger than aspiration the strategy keeps, otherwise the strategy changes. The simulation results show that a high level aspiration will lead to more cooperation. With the increment of the statistic length, pedestrians will be more rational in decision making. It is also found that when the aspiration level is small enough and the statistic length is large enough all the pedestrian will turn to defectors. We use the prisoner's dilemma model to explain it. At last we discuss the effect of aspiration on fundamental diagram.

Framework for selection and evaluation of bicycle and pedestrian safety projects in Virginia.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2008-01-01

The Virginia Department of Transportation's (VDOT) Bicycle and Pedestrian Safety (BPS) Program provides funds for implementing short-term, low-cost bicycle and pedestrian safety projects in Virginia. This initiative is administered by evaluating each...

Evaluation of surrogate measures for pedestrian safety in various road and roadside environments.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2012-10-01

This report presents an investigation of pedestrian conflicts and crash count models to learn which exposure measures and roadway or roadside characteristics significantly influence pedestrian safety at road crossings. Negative binomial models were e...

Error Analysis in a Stereo Vision-Based Pedestrian Detection Sensor for Collision Avoidance Applications

PubMed Central

Llorca, David F.; Sotelo, Miguel A.; Parra, Ignacio; Ocaña, Manuel; Bergasa, Luis M.

2010-01-01

This paper presents an analytical study of the depth estimation error of a stereo vision-based pedestrian detection sensor for automotive applications such as pedestrian collision avoidance and/or mitigation. The sensor comprises two synchronized and calibrated low-cost cameras. Pedestrians are detected by combining a 3D clustering method with Support Vector Machine-based (SVM) classification. The influence of the sensor parameters in the stereo quantization errors is analyzed in detail providing a point of reference for choosing the sensor setup according to the application requirements. The sensor is then validated in real experiments. Collision avoidance maneuvers by steering are carried out by manual driving. A real time kinematic differential global positioning system (RTK-DGPS) is used to provide ground truth data corresponding to both the pedestrian and the host vehicle locations. The performed field test provided encouraging results and proved the validity of the proposed sensor for being used in the automotive sector towards applications such as autonomous pedestrian collision avoidance. PMID:22319323

Error analysis in a stereo vision-based pedestrian detection sensor for collision avoidance applications.

PubMed

Llorca, David F; Sotelo, Miguel A; Parra, Ignacio; Ocaña, Manuel; Bergasa, Luis M

2010-01-01

This paper presents an analytical study of the depth estimation error of a stereo vision-based pedestrian detection sensor for automotive applications such as pedestrian collision avoidance and/or mitigation. The sensor comprises two synchronized and calibrated low-cost cameras. Pedestrians are detected by combining a 3D clustering method with Support Vector Machine-based (SVM) classification. The influence of the sensor parameters in the stereo quantization errors is analyzed in detail providing a point of reference for choosing the sensor setup according to the application requirements. The sensor is then validated in real experiments. Collision avoidance maneuvers by steering are carried out by manual driving. A real time kinematic differential global positioning system (RTK-DGPS) is used to provide ground truth data corresponding to both the pedestrian and the host vehicle locations. The performed field test provided encouraging results and proved the validity of the proposed sensor for being used in the automotive sector towards applications such as autonomous pedestrian collision avoidance.

Urban Sprawl as a Risk Factor in Motor Vehicle Occupant and Pedestrian Fatalities

PubMed Central

Ewing, Reid; Schieber, Richard A.; Zegeer, Charles V.

2003-01-01

Objectives. We sought to determine the association between urban sprawl and traffic fatalities. Methods. We created a sprawl index by applying principal components analysis to data for 448 US counties in the largest 101 metropolitan areas. Regression analysis was used to determine associations between the index and traffic fatalities. Results. For every 1% increase in the index (i.e., more compact, less sprawl), all-mode traffic fatality rates fell by 1.49% (P < .001) and pedestrian fatality rates fell by 1.47% to 3.56%, after adjustment for pedestrian exposure (P < .001). Conclusions. Urban sprawl was directly related to traffic fatalities and pedestrian fatalities. Subsequent studies should investigate relationships at a finer geographic scale and should strive to improve on the measure of exposure used to adjust pedestrian fatality rates. PMID:12948977

Using smartphone technology to deliver a virtual pedestrian environment: usability and validation.

PubMed

Schwebel, David C; Severson, Joan; He, Yefei

2017-09-01

Various programs effectively teach children to cross streets more safely, but all are labor- and cost-intensive. Recent developments in mobile phone technology offer opportunity to deliver virtual reality pedestrian environments to mobile smartphone platforms. Such an environment may offer a cost- and labor-effective strategy to teach children to cross streets safely. This study evaluated usability, feasibility, and validity of a smartphone-based virtual pedestrian environment. A total of 68 adults completed 12 virtual crossings within each of two virtual pedestrian environments, one delivered by smartphone and the other a semi-immersive kiosk virtual environment. Participants completed self-report measures of perceived realism and simulator sickness experienced in each virtual environment, plus self-reported demographic and personality characteristics. All participants followed system instructions and used the smartphone-based virtual environment without difficulty. No significant simulator sickness was reported or observed. Users rated the smartphone virtual environment as highly realistic. Convergent validity was detected, with many aspects of pedestrian behavior in the smartphone-based virtual environment matching behavior in the kiosk virtual environment. Anticipated correlations between personality and kiosk virtual reality pedestrian behavior emerged for the smartphone-based system. A smartphone-based virtual environment can be usable and valid. Future research should develop and evaluate such a training system.

Motor vehicle and pedestrian collisions: burden of severe injury on major versus neighborhood roads.

PubMed

Rothman, Linda; Slater, Morgan; Meaney, Christopher; Howard, Andrew

2010-02-01

To determine whether the severity of injuries sustained by pedestrians involved in motor vehicle collisions varies by road type and age. All police-reported pedestrian motor vehicle collisions in the city of Toronto, Canada, between January 1, 2000, and December 31, 2005, were analyzed. Geographic Information Systems software was used to determine whether the collisions occurred on major or neighborhood roads. Age-specific estimates of the burden of pedestrian collisions are presented. Odds ratios and 95 percent confidence intervals were calculated to examine age-specific relationships between injury severity and road type. A second analysis comparing the distribution of severe injury location between age groups was also performed. The majority of collisions involved adults (68%), although elderly pedestrians were overrepresented in fatal collisions (49%). Severe and fatal collisions involving working-age and elderly adult pedestrians were more likely on major roads. Odds of severe injury occurring on a major road were 1.36 (95% CI: 1.17-1.57) times higher for adults ages 18 to 64, and 1.55 (95% CI: 1.22-1.99) times higher for elderly aged 65+. By contrast, severe injuries among children were more common on neighborhood roads, with odds of severe injury on a major road of 0.64 (95% CI: 0.37-1.1) for children aged 5 to 9. Among children under 9, 64-67 percent of hospitalized or fatal injuries occurred on neighborhood roads, a marked difference from the distribution of such injuries in adults or the elderly, for whom only 29-30 percent of hospitalized or fatal injuries occurred on neighborhood roads (chi-square = 52.6, p < or =.001). Targeting interventions toward the adult pedestrian burden on major roads alone will not make child pedestrians safer. Pedestrian interventions specific to children and focused on neighborhood roads must be considered in urban centers like Toronto.

A finite element model of a six-year-old child for simulating pedestrian accidents.

PubMed

Meng, Yunzhu; Pak, Wansoo; Guleyupoglu, Berkan; Koya, Bharath; Gayzik, F Scott; Untaroiu, Costin D

2017-01-01

Child pedestrian protection deserves more attention in vehicle safety design since they are the most vulnerable road users who face the highest mortality rate. Pediatric Finite Element (FE) models could be used to simulate and understand the pedestrian injury mechanisms during crashes in order to mitigate them. Thus, the objective of the study was to develop a computationally efficient (simplified) six-year-old (6YO-PS) pedestrian FE model and validate it based on the latest published pediatric data. The 6YO-PS FE model was developed by morphing the existing GHBMC adult pedestrian model. Retrospective scan data were used to locally adjust the geometry as needed for accuracy. Component test simulations focused only the lower extremities and pelvis, which are the first body regions impacted during pedestrian accidents. Three-point bending test simulations were performed on the femur and tibia with adult material properties and then updated using child material properties. Pelvis impact and knee bending tests were also simulated. Finally, a series of pediatric Car-to-Pedestrian Collision (CPC) were simulated with pre-impact velocities ranging from 20km/h up to 60km/h. The bone models assigned pediatric material properties showed lower stiffness and a good match in terms of fracture force to the test data (less than 6% error). The pelvis impact force predicted by the child model showed a similar trend with test data. The whole pedestrian model was stable during CPC simulations and predicted common pedestrian injuries. Overall, the 6YO-PS FE model developed in this study showed good biofidelity at component level (lower extremity and pelvis) and stability in CPC simulations. While more validations would improve it, the current model could be used to investigate the lower limb injury mechanisms and in the prediction of the impact parameters as specified in regulatory testing protocols. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Development of estimation methodology for bicycle and pedestrian volumes based on existing counts.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2013-10-01

The Colorado Department of Transportation (CDOT) adopted the Bicycle and Pedestrian Policy directive in 2009 : stating that "...the needs of bicyclists and pedestrians shall be included in the planning, design, and operation of : transportation facil...

36 CFR 910.17 - Pedestrian circulation system.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-07-01

... GENERAL GUIDELINES AND UNIFORM STANDARDS FOR URBAN PLANNING AND DESIGN OF DEVELOPMENT WITHIN THE PENNSYLVANIA AVENUE DEVELOPMENT AREA Urban Planning and Design Concerns § 910.17 Pedestrian circulation system...

36 CFR 910.17 - Pedestrian circulation system.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-07-01

... GENERAL GUIDELINES AND UNIFORM STANDARDS FOR URBAN PLANNING AND DESIGN OF DEVELOPMENT WITHIN THE PENNSYLVANIA AVENUE DEVELOPMENT AREA Urban Planning and Design Concerns § 910.17 Pedestrian circulation system...

33 CFR 117.801 - Newtown Creek, Dutch Kills, English Kills and their tributaries.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-07-01

..., English Kills and their tributaries. 117.801 Section 117.801 Navigation and Navigable Waters COAST GUARD....801 Newtown Creek, Dutch Kills, English Kills and their tributaries. (a) The following requirements apply to all bridges across Newtown Creek, Dutch Kills, English Kills, and their tributaries: (1) The...

Demonstration and evaluation of the Heed the Speed pedestrian safety program : traffic tech.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2012-07-01

Research has shown that higher vehicular speeds are : related to increased pedestrian injury severity and death. : It is unclear, however, if lowering vehicle speeds in residential : areas would result in lower frequency of pedestrian-involved : cras...

The characterization and evaluation of accidental explosions

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Strehlow, R. A.; Baker, W. E.

1975-01-01

Accidental explosions are discussed from a number of viewpoints. First, all accidental explosions, intentional explosions and natural explosions are characterized by type. Second, the nature of the blast wave produced by an ideal (point source or HE) explosion is discussed to form a basis for describing how other explosion processes yield deviations from ideal blast wave behavior. The current status blast damage mechanism evaluation is also discussed. Third, the current status of our understanding of each different category of accidental explosions is discussed in some detail.

Collective phenomena in crowds—Where pedestrian dynamics need social psychology

PubMed Central

2017-01-01

This article is on collective phenomena in pedestrian dynamics during the assembling and dispersal of gatherings. To date pedestrian dynamics have been primarily studied in the natural and engineering sciences. Pedestrians are analyzed and modeled as driven particles revealing self-organizing phenomena and complex transport characteristics. However, pedestrians in crowds also behave as living beings according to stimulus-response mechanisms or act as human subjects on the basis of social norms, social identities or strategies. To show where pedestrian dynamics need social psychology in addition to the natural sciences we propose the application of three categories–phenomena, behavior and action. They permit a clear discrimination between situations in which minimal models from the natural sciences are appropriate and those in which sociological and psychological concepts are needed. To demonstrate the necessity of this framework, an experiment in which a large group of people (n = 270) enters a concert hall through two different spatial barrier structures is analyzed. These two structures correspond to everyday situations such as boarding trains and access to immigration desks. Methods from the natural and social sciences are applied. Firstly, physical measurements show the influence of the spatial structure on the dynamics of the entrance procedure. Density, waiting time and speed of progress show large variations. Secondly, a questionnaire study (n = 60) reveals how people perceive and evaluate these entrance situations. Markedly different expectations, social norms and strategies are associated with the two spatial structures. The results from the questionnaire study do not always conform to objective physical measures, indicating the limitations of models which are based on objective physical measures alone and which neglect subjective perspectives. PMID:28591142

Collective phenomena in crowds-Where pedestrian dynamics need social psychology.

PubMed

Sieben, Anna; Schumann, Jette; Seyfried, Armin

2017-01-01

This article is on collective phenomena in pedestrian dynamics during the assembling and dispersal of gatherings. To date pedestrian dynamics have been primarily studied in the natural and engineering sciences. Pedestrians are analyzed and modeled as driven particles revealing self-organizing phenomena and complex transport characteristics. However, pedestrians in crowds also behave as living beings according to stimulus-response mechanisms or act as human subjects on the basis of social norms, social identities or strategies. To show where pedestrian dynamics need social psychology in addition to the natural sciences we propose the application of three categories-phenomena, behavior and action. They permit a clear discrimination between situations in which minimal models from the natural sciences are appropriate and those in which sociological and psychological concepts are needed. To demonstrate the necessity of this framework, an experiment in which a large group of people (n = 270) enters a concert hall through two different spatial barrier structures is analyzed. These two structures correspond to everyday situations such as boarding trains and access to immigration desks. Methods from the natural and social sciences are applied. Firstly, physical measurements show the influence of the spatial structure on the dynamics of the entrance procedure. Density, waiting time and speed of progress show large variations. Secondly, a questionnaire study (n = 60) reveals how people perceive and evaluate these entrance situations. Markedly different expectations, social norms and strategies are associated with the two spatial structures. The results from the questionnaire study do not always conform to objective physical measures, indicating the limitations of models which are based on objective physical measures alone and which neglect subjective perspectives.

Walking the line: Understanding pedestrian behaviour and risk at rail level crossings with cognitive work analysis.

PubMed

Read, Gemma J M; Salmon, Paul M; Lenné, Michael G; Stanton, Neville A

2016-03-01

Pedestrian fatalities at rail level crossings (RLXs) are a public safety concern for governments worldwide. There is little literature examining pedestrian behaviour at RLXs and no previous studies have adopted a formative approach to understanding behaviour in this context. In this article, cognitive work analysis is applied to understand the constraints that shape pedestrian behaviour at RLXs in Melbourne, Australia. The five phases of cognitive work analysis were developed using data gathered via document analysis, behavioural observation, walk-throughs and critical decision method interviews. The analysis demonstrates the complex nature of pedestrian decision making at RLXs and the findings are synthesised to provide a model illustrating the influences on pedestrian decision making in this context (i.e. time, effort and social pressures). Further, the CWA outputs are used to inform an analysis of the risks to safety associated with pedestrian behaviour at RLXs and the identification of potential interventions to reduce risk. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd and The Ergonomics Society. All rights reserved.

Effective environmental factors on geographical distribution of traffic accidents on pedestrians, downtown Tehran city.

PubMed

Moradi, Ali; Soori, Hamid; Kavousi, Amir; Eshghabadi, Farshid; Nematollahi, Shahrzad; Zeini, Salahdien

2017-01-01

In most countries, occurrence of traffic causalities is high in pedestrians. The aim of this study is to geographically analyze the traffic casualties in pedestrians in downtown Tehran city. The study population consisted of traffic injury accidents in pedestrians occurred during 2015 in Tehran city. Data were extracted from offices of traffic police and municipality. For analysis of environmental factors and site of accidents, ordinary least square regression models and geographically weighted regression were used. Fitness and performance of models were checked using the Akaike information criteria, Bayesian information criteria, deviance, and adjusted R 2 . Totally, 514 accidents were included in this study. Of them, site of accidents was arterial streets in 370 (71.9%) cases, collector streets in 133 cases (25.2%), and highways in 11 cases (2.1%). Geographical units of traffic accidents in pedestrians had statistically significant relationship with a number of bus stations, number of crossroads, and recreational areas. Distribution of injury traffic accidents in pedestrians is different in downtown Tehran city. Neighborhoods close to markets are considered as most dangerous neighborhoods for injury traffic accidents. Different environmental factors are involved in determining the distribution of these accidents. The health of pedestrians in Tehran city can be improved by proper traffic management, control of environmental factors, and educational programs.

Assessing contextual factors that influence acceptance of pedestrian alerts by a night vision system.

PubMed

Källhammer, Jan-Erik; Smith, Kip

2012-08-01

We investigated five contextual variables that we hypothesized would influence driver acceptance of alerts to pedestrians issued by a night vision active safety system to inform the specification of the system's alerting strategies. Driver acceptance of automotive active safety systems is a key factor to promote their use and implies a need to assess factors influencing driver acceptance. In a field operational test, 10 drivers drove instrumented vehicles equipped with a preproduction night vision system with pedestrian detection software. In a follow-up experiment, the 10 drivers and 25 additional volunteers without experience with the system watched 57 clips with pedestrian encounters gathered during the field operational test. They rated the acceptance of an alert to each pedestrian encounter. Levels of rating concordance were significant between drivers who experienced the encounters and participants who did not. Two contextual variables, pedestrian location and motion, were found to influence ratings. Alerts were more accepted when pedestrians were close to or moving toward the vehicle's path. The study demonstrates the utility of using subjective driver acceptance ratings to inform the design of active safety systems and to leverage expensive field operational test data within the confines of the laboratory. The design of alerting strategies for active safety systems needs to heed the driver's contextual sensitivity to issued alerts.

Illegal road crossing behavior of pedestrians at overpass locations: Factors affecting gap acceptance, crossing times and overpass use.

PubMed

Demiroz, Y I; Onelcin, P; Alver, Y

2015-07-01

The aim of designing overpasses is to provide safe road crossings for pedestrians by helping them to avoid conflicts with motor vehicles. However, the number of pedestrians who do not use overpasses to cross the road is very high. An observational survey of illegal road crossings was conducted at four overpass locations in Izmir, Turkey to determine the crossing time, crossing speed of the pedestrians and their distance and time gap perception for safe road-crossing within 25 m of the overpasses in both directions. Crossing time is the time needed for a pedestrian to cross a particular road. Time gap is strongly related with safety margin. If a pedestrian chooses a larger time gap, then the arrival time of the oncoming vehicle to the crossing point of the pedestrian increases thus, the possibility of a collision decreases. Each overpass was observed on weekdays during peak afternoon (12.30-13.30) and evening hours (17.00-18.00). At all overpass locations 454 illegal crossings were observed. ANOVA results revealed that age had a significant effect both on safety margin and crossing time. During the observations a survey was conducted among pedestrians who completed their crossings either using the overpass or at street level within 25 m of the overpass (n=231). Factors affecting the crossing choice of pedestrians were specified in the surveys. The major part of the respondents (71.7%) indicated that time saving was the main reason for crossing at street level. Pedestrians' crossing speeds were extracted from the video recordings to observe the effect of speed limit on pedestrian behavior. As a result, at locations where the speed limit was 70 km/h, pedestrians' average crossing speed was found to be 1.60 m/s and 1.73 m/s while at locations where the speed limit was 50 km/h, pedestrians' average crossing speed was found to be 1.04 m/s and 0.97 m/s. This shows that pedestrians feel safer while crossing when the vehicle speed is low. Copyright © 2015. Published by

Cooper Drive pedestrian study : final report.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2006-07-01

The purpose of this report is to summarize the findings of the pedestrian study conducted for Cooper Drive from Nicholasville Road to Sports Center Drive on the University of Kentucky Campus in Lexington, KY. This study was initiated by the Universit...

Identification of high pedestrian crash locations.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2018-03-01

An initial step in reducing the frequency of pedestrian crashes is identifying where they occur or where there is a concern they are likely to occur. As part of a Federal Highway Administration project, the Guidebook on Identification of High Pedestr...

Killing fetuses and killing newborns.

PubMed

Di Nucci, Ezio

2013-05-01

The argument for the moral permissibility of killing newborns is a challenge to liberal positions on abortion because it can be considered a reductio of their defence of abortion. Here I defend the liberal stance on abortion by arguing that the argument for the moral permissibility of killing newborns on ground of the social, psychological and economic burden on the parents recently put forward by Giubilini and Minerva is not valid; this is because they fail to show that newborns cannot be harmed and because there are morally relevant differences between fetuses and newborns.

21 CFR 1002.20 - Reporting of accidental radiation occurrences.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-04-01

... 21 Food and Drugs 8 2014-04-01 2014-04-01 false Reporting of accidental radiation occurrences... SERVICES (CONTINUED) RADIOLOGICAL HEALTH RECORDS AND REPORTS Manufacturers' Reports on Accidental Radiation Occurrences § 1002.20 Reporting of accidental radiation occurrences. (a) Manufacturers of electronic products...

21 CFR 1002.20 - Reporting of accidental radiation occurrences.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-04-01

... 21 Food and Drugs 8 2013-04-01 2013-04-01 false Reporting of accidental radiation occurrences... SERVICES (CONTINUED) RADIOLOGICAL HEALTH RECORDS AND REPORTS Manufacturers' Reports on Accidental Radiation Occurrences § 1002.20 Reporting of accidental radiation occurrences. (a) Manufacturers of electronic products...

21 CFR 1002.20 - Reporting of accidental radiation occurrences.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-04-01

... 21 Food and Drugs 8 2012-04-01 2012-04-01 false Reporting of accidental radiation occurrences... SERVICES (CONTINUED) RADIOLOGICAL HEALTH RECORDS AND REPORTS Manufacturers' Reports on Accidental Radiation Occurrences § 1002.20 Reporting of accidental radiation occurrences. (a) Manufacturers of electronic products...

The joint effect of personality traits and perceived stress on pedestrian behavior in a Chinese sample