Behavior Analysis of Pedestrians’ Crossing Location Choice by Virtual Reality Experiment

Abstract

Recently, unsignalized crossing facilities including two-stage crossings are focused to reduce crossing outside of crosswalks (jaywalking) and to increase safe crossing opportunities. However, the quantitative effect of such facilities by changing the location and type for reducing jaywalking is not clear. This research conducted a virtual reality experiment to analyze the impact of locations and types of unsignalized crossing facilities on individual pedestrians’ crossing location choice. The results revealed that pedestrians chose unsignalized crossing facilities as their crossing locations, especially when zebra markings were available rather than when the facilities were only refuge islands without pavement markings. Furthermore, as compared to the ratio of jaywalking declared in advance of the experiment, the ratio of actual jaywalking was higher. The sequential choice model showed that the existence of the vehicles when pedestrians arrive at candidate locations of crossing influences jaywalking behavior. This would make the difference between pre-declared and actual crossing location choices.