A study on pedestrian choice between stairway and escalator in the transfer station based on floor field cellular automata

Stairway and escalator are the main transfer facilities in the station where pedestrians make choices between them. A good understanding of pedestrian choices is helpful to raise the efficiency of transfer stations and lower the probability of disasters, such as stamps caused by congestion. This paper studies the choice behavior of pedestrians using random utility theory and floor field cellular automata. Among the factors influencing pedestrian choices, there are non-quantitative ones and quantitative ones. Thus, a method combining qualitative description and quantitative description is adopted. Subsequently, a logit model is presented to mimic the choice behaviors of pedestrians. In this model, there are three new important parameters, including familiarity, walking disutility, and time pressure. By using micro-simulation, a sensitivity analysis for these parameters is conducted. Besides, a counting rule based on the Large Number Law is presented to count the real data in transfer stations in Shanghai. After comparing the sensitivity analysis results and measurement data, several reference values of the three important parameters are obtained in un-congested and congested situations respectively. (C) 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.