Human-centered designs, characteristics of urban streets, and pedestrian perceptions

Summary This paper presents the results of a study conducted to examine the characteristics of human-centered design and pedestrians' perceptions of street design features. The main emphasis was to determine the existence of empirical evidence that human-centered design increases pedestrian satisfaction levels and enhances community walkability. The following approach was applied in the study: (i) the existing research concerning walkable community and pedestrian facility designs was reviewed; (ii) survey data from pedestrian interviews regarding urban streets as well as the detailed geometric features of the interview sites were gathered; (iii) statistical analysis to determine whether pedestrians actually feel more satisfied when they walk in areas with human-centered design was conducted based on actual pedestrian interview scores for various street design features; and (iv) major design features to increase pedestrian satisfaction levels were identified. The study results show that pedestrians perceived planting strips as the most important design element that would increase the satisfaction scores whereas they perceived the presence of driveways and the number of vehicle lanes as design elements that that would diminish the scores. Overall, the valuable findings of this research provide evidence of the various effects of the application of human-centered design and improve our understanding of walkable communities.