Research of Urban Pedestrian Flow Using Wi-Fi/Bluetooth Packet Sensors

Abstract

Smartphones have become an indispensable part of modern life, and many people carry them with them. Wireless communications such as Wi-Fi and Bluetooth are used in these devices, and research has been conducted on human flow analysis using data obtained from Wi-Fi packet sensing. In recent years, however, privacy protection of Wi-Fi addresses has become more important, making it difficult to identify MAC addresses, which are unique identifiers of terminals. On the other hand, Bluetooth functionality has been installed in various devices, and its MAC address has become a standard that does not change for about 15 minutes. In this study, we summarize the current status of data that can be obtained from hybrid Wi-Fi and Bluetooth sensors, show the characteristics of data obtained from Bluetooth packet sensors, and verify the possibility of reproducing pedestrian traffic volume. We also examine the potential of Bluetooth data for pedestrian path analysis.