The crossing speed and safety margin of pedestrians at signalized intersections

Pedestrians are the vulnerable part of the road users worldwide. A significant number of pedestrian fatalities occur in road traffic accidents each year. Hence, to minimize the pedestrian-vehicle accidents it is important to optimize the signal timings according to pedestrians' crossing speeds and delays at signalized intersections and to understand the pedestrians' safety perception. This paper investigates the pedestrians' crossing speeds, delays and gap perceptions at six signalized intersections in Izmir, Turkey. The crosswalk where the pedestrian density is high at each intersection was selected for observations. Each intersection was observed on weekdays during afternoon peak (12.30-13.30) and evening peak (17.00-18.00) hours using video cameras. In total, 2,694 pedestrian crossings were observed. The average crossing speed is found to be 1.31 m/s and the average 15th percentile crossing speed is found to be 1.07 m/s. Existing delay models are compared with the observed delays and the results showed that none of the models give good results to explain the observed delays and a new model is needed. Speed limit and position* speed limit interaction revealed significant effects on safety margin. (C) 2017 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V.