Drivability vs. Walkability: Assessing Shorter- and Longer-Term Transportation Planning Tradeoffs in a Chinese Context

This paper describes how cities in developing countries often invest large sums to build highways and arterials serving a rapidly growing number of automobiles. Although highway investments are a priority, walking remains the most common mode of transport and buses (or motorbikes) the most common form of motor vehicle in use. The wide new arterials deliver short-term employment and construction spending benefits and in the longer term can contribute to increased productivity. On the other hand, their design and operation can reduce accessibility for pedestrians, bicyclists, and transit users, unless explicit efforts are made to make the facilities multimodal. This paper examines tradeoffs in designing for drivability versus walkability as they have arisen in Fushun, a medium-sized city in China. Through a series of field observations, the authors document how street design, land uses, and pedestrian attitudes and behaviors interact. The paper also documents high levels of disregard for pedestrian crossing and traffic rules by both drivers and pedestrians, with midblock crossings (“jaywalking”) a frequent occurrence and failure to stop for pedestrians a common driver behavior. The paper uses surveys and follow-up focus groups to determine why pedestrians cross major arterials midblock, and find that the reasons were a combination of convenience (shorter distances, less physical exertion) and defiance of the growing automobile dominance of what had once been shared space. The paper concludes that not only physical improvements but also a better balancing of space allocation will be needed to improve pedestrian safety, along with broader education on traffic safety and greater enforcement.

• Corporate Authors:

  World Conference on Transport Research Society

  Secretariat, 14 Avenue Berthelot
  69363 Lyon cedex 07,   France 
• Authors:
  • Tao, Wendy
  • Mehndiratta, Shomik Raj
  • Deakin, Elizabeth
• Conference:
  • 11th World Conference on Transport Research
  • Location: Berkeley CA, United States
  • Date: 2007-6-24 to 2007-6-28
• Publication Date: 2007

Language

• English

Media Info

• Media Type: CD-ROM
• Features: Figures; Maps; References; Tables;
• Pagination: 14p
• Monograph Title: 11th World Conference on Transport Research

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Arterial highways; Developing countries; Highway design; Multimodal transportation; Pedestrian safety; Pedestrians; Public transit; Surveys; Traffic safety; Transportation planning; Walkability
• Geographic Terms: China; Fushun (China)
• Subject Areas: Design; Highways; I20: Design and Planning of Transport Infrastructure;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01130285
• Record Type: Publication
• Files: TRIS
• Created Date: Jun 19 2009 9:28AM