Environment-deterministic pedestrian behavior? New insights from surveillance video evidence

The study of pedestrians' walking behavior, especially its relationship with environmental factors, is of great theoretical and practical importance. However, at the micro-scale, the nature of such relationships has yet to be clarified. In this paper, utilizing surveillance video data and applying a standardized, generalizable, and accurate trajectory-extraction workflow that we developed, we build statistical models to explain the spatial pattern of pedestrian trajectories with a waterfront case. Results show that up to 71% of the spatial distribution of pedestrian trajectories can be explained by two environmental factors, namely road midlines and obstacles. The findings are in line with what the Social Force Model would predict as road midlines constitute a balancing position of the various attracting or repelling forces of the environmental factors along a road. Other factors, including attractors and spatial boundaries demonstrate no statistically significant contribution, which imply a scale-dependent mechanism and the possible existence of a “tele-coupling” effect in pedestrian-environment interactions. The revelation of the deterministic nature of pedestrian behaviors, along with the detailed influencing mechanisms of various environmental factors might benefit physical environment-building through the calculation of a perceptual environmental field, which would enable precise pedestrian flow control in planning and design.