540 / 2019-02-28 20:49:34

Pedestrian Walkway Evaluation by VR Tool in Bangkok

Walkway,Pedestrian,Virtual Reality,Evaluation

全体主题 > Planning Support Systems

Pedestrian-friendly walkway is the key factor in encouraging people to use rail transit. However most of walkway in Bangkok is not very user friendly. This study is to evaluate the pedestrian walkway by using VR tool. The advantage of the VR tool is that it provides pseudo-environment of walking where every respondent can watch, feel, and sound the same circumstance of walking. It also allows to do the evaluation survey in the other city or country that respondent is present. In this study, VR video clip is recorded by using a 360-degree video camera and the video clip is viewed by VR goggle that is connected to a powerful personal computer that the graphical processing capability is large. Three video clip is recorded in the three case study areas in Bangkok are namely Silom station, National stadium station, and Siam Square Shopping District.
50 respondents, who are the undergraduate and graduate students in Kasetsart University, are asked to view the 3D VR video clip of the three case study areas in Bangkok while wearing VR goggle. The length for each video is 2 minutes. They are also asked to view similar video of walkway in Sake shopping district in Nagoya, Japan.
At the end each respondent is asked to evaluate each of the walkway case study that they just virtually experienced. 7 level Likert-scale is employed in evaluating the factors as follows: Safety to road traffic - the number of road crossing, presence of speed bump on road; Safety and security of walking - crime risk free, obstruction by electric pole, presence of guardrail installed to provide pedestrian safety; Physical condition - walkway width, roughness or smoothness of the walkway pavement, walkway architectural design and decoration, greenness; Facility provision - presence of bench, presence of bus stop along the walk route, clear division of bicycle lane sharing on the walkway surface, designated bicycle parking stand, pavement marking for vision impaired; and Convenience - presence of activity on the walkway along the route, walking pleasure, walking time satisfaction, attractiveness of shop or street vendor. The evaluation result reveals that physical condition and liveliness of the walkway are among the most influential factors. The factor analysis reveals latent preference of people walking in the case study areas such as convenience, safety, environment, and behavior. The findings provide inside for future design and improvement of the pedestrian walkway in order to encourage more walking in Thailand.