Critical features about urban pedestrian crossings: a case study

The theme of safety for vulnerable road users (disabled, elderly, and children) in urban areas plays a role of primary interest for many implications in quality of life. The deficiency of safety on city streets is primarily due to the simultaneous presence of different components of traffic in an increasingly complex and inappropriate ambient for their cohabitation. In urban areas the road intersections, which are crossed by different categories of traffic (motorized vehicles, pedestrians, non-motorized vehicles), represent a critical node, both in terms of quality of circulation that of road safety. In recent years there has been the 76.62% of accidents in the urban area, with the 13% of accidents involving pedestrians of which about 30% of accidents occurred near intersections. All these reasons explain the complexity in the planning of an intersection, particularly when vulnerable users are involved. In this paper we propose an applicative study of "pedestrian crossings", regulated by traffic lights or free, and what factors affect their planning and design to achieve an optimal quality of service and high safety standards. The study area involves one of the main streets of city of Palermo, which link the city center and some of the suburbs, focusing on the design of pedestrian crossings and their location in the urban context, starting by existing legislation in order to achieve an optimization of the number of pedestrian crossings, the distance between them and traffic light cycle if present. In particular we can design a possible new layout of pedestrian crossings, starting by analysis the current configuration and its critical points and simulating different future scenarios that take into account the dual role of the street inside and outside the district and in the whole urban network.