Development of a model for the estimation of pedestrian level of service in Greek urban areas

This paper aims to develop a new model, applicable to the Greek urban environment, for the estimation of pedestrian level of service, since available methodologies usually refer to quite different conditions than the prevailing ones in Greek cities. For this purpose, first a review of the available methodologies estimating pedestrian level of service was conducted and a combination of the most appropriate factors for Greek conditions was selected as the basic input for the formulation of the new model. The model was then applied in parallel with other five (5) methodologies along a sidewalk in the city of Thessaloniki Furthermore, an extensive questionnaire survey was implemented along the above sidewalk and revealed that the perceived quality of service of pedestrian movements was in accordance with the results of the application of the proposed model. In the meantime the questionnaire survey is going on, extended to residents and experts as well, for the finalization of model's calibration. (C) 2012 Published by Elsevier Ltd. Selection and/or peer review under responsibility of the Programme Committee of the Transport Research Arena 2012