Citation

Kattan L, Acharjee S, Tay R. Transp. Res. Rec. 2009; 2140: 79-84.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2009, Transportation Research Board, National Research Council, National Academy of Sciences USA, Publisher SAGE Publishing)

DOI

10.3141/2140-08

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

The City of Calgary, Alberta, Canada, has implemented a pilot test of the pedestrian scramble operation (also known as the Barnes dance) at two intersections in the downtown area. Pedestrian scramble is an exclusive pedestrian signal phase in which traffic in all four directions is stopped and pedestrians are allowed to make diagonal as well as lateral crossings. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the pilot project at one intersection to determine the effect of this new operation on pedestrian safety. Because of the absence of pedestrian-vehicle crashes in this study, the number of pedestrian conflicts was used as a surrogate measure of safety. Field observations were made 6 weeks after the implementation of the scramble operation. Two Poisson regression models were developed to model the number of conflicts and violations. The results showed that the number of pedestrian-vehicle conflicts decreased significantly but the number of pedestrian violations increased significantly after implementation of the scramble operation. The analysis also revealed that 13% of the total violations were "safe side" crossings (concurrent with the vehicle movement), 2% of the violations were "unsafe side" crossings, and about 40% of the total violations were at the beginning of the flashing "Don't Walk" phase (within 2 to 3 s) and persons were able to cross safely within the pedestrian phase. A survey was also conducted to monitor public perception, and the results showed a generally positive attitude toward this new signal operation. It is recommended that the operation be monitored over time and evaluated again.