Where Do Pedestrians Jaywalk and How to Drivers React? -- A Study in a Campus Environment

Pedestrian and driver behaviors as well as their interactions, are essential in planning, designing and operating highway facilities. Jaywalking, i.e., pedestrian crossing outside of a marked or unmarked crosswalk, is one of those pedestrian behaviors that may affect safety and operations. Unlike permissible crossings at crosswalks, jaywalking events are not always anticipated by drivers, which may result in less driver reaction time and different vehicle operation dynamics. From an operations and planning perspective, it is important to understand how drivers yield to jaywalkers vs. other crossing pedestrians, as well as the jaywalking gap acceptance and speeds. However, little quantitative and behavioral research has been conducted to investigate this interaction. This paper aims to explore both pedestrian jaywalking behavior (gap acceptance and speeds) and the corresponding driver reactions (yielding behavior). The study also quantifies the differences between jaywalking and regular vehicle-pedestrian interactions. An instrumented vehicle study (from driver’s perspective) and an observational study (from pedestrian’s perspective) on the campus of the University of Florida were conducted to collect data related to both perspectives. It was found that the locations of jaywalking events are highly concentrated and influenced by the crossing environment, such as pedestrian and vehicular volume, bus stops presence and crossing distance. Also, large differences were observed in crossing speed, yield acceptance and delay between permissible crossings and jaywalking crossings. Similarly, different driver behaviors were observed when approaching jaywalkers vs. pedestrians at a crosswalk. They are less likely to yield to jaywalkers and decelerate more for pedestrians within a crosswalk. These differences in driver behavior may in turn affect jaywalker operations. This paper establishes several quantitative relationships in vehicle-jaywalker interactions which have implications for pedestrian safety, crosswalk design, pedestrian movement planning, as well as driver behavior modeling for traffic operational analyses.