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Driver/Pedestrian Understanding and Behavior at Marked and Unmarked Crosswalks

Crosswalk Survey Project

A great number of pedestrian injuries and deaths result from the failure of drivers and pedestrians to observe the vehicle code. The premise of this project is that a better understanding of the factors contributing to this failure will enable more effective countermeasures.

In 2002, 22.7 percent of U.S. pedestrians involved in collisions were in a crosswalk at the time of the collision, and nearly all of these occurred at an intersection. Nearly all the crosswalk collisions resulted in pedestrian injury or fatality, with nearly one-third resulting in severe or fatal injury. More than80 percent of these crosswalk collisions were related to driver behavior including Vehicle Turn/Merge (51.5 percent), Intersection-Other (18.6 percent), and Intersection-Driver violations (14.3 percent). 

Rates of severe or fatal injury from crosswalk collisions were higher at uncontrolled locations (41.1 percent) compared to locations with a traffic control signal (33.9 percent), stop sign (13.3 percent), or some other type of control (16.7 percent). Most (71.4 percent) non-intersection crosswalks tend to be uncontrolled (i.e. no signage or signalization), versus 19.7 percent of crosswalks at intersections).

Taken together, these findings demonstrate that to reduce pedestrian injury, we need to better understand driver behavior in response to location-control types and in response to pedestrian behavior at crosswalks.

A great number of pedestrian injures and deaths are due to the failure of both drivers and pedestrians to follow the vehicle code, which states that 1) The driver of a vehicle shall yield the right-of-way to a pedestrian crossing the roadway within any marked crosswalk or within any unmarked crosswalk at an intersection and 2) Every pedestrian upon a roadway at any point other than within a marked crosswalk or within an unmarked crosswalk at an intersection shall yield the right of-way to all vehicles upon the roadway so near as to constitute an immediate hazard. The failure of both drivers and pedestrians to follow this code is likely due to several factors operating separately or together. Broadly, categories of factors include:

• Lack of knowledge of the vehicle code. This could apply differentially to marked vs. unmarked crosswalks,
• Knowledge of the vehicle code, but perceiving that the code is not enforced and is, therefore, routinely ignored,
• Regardless of knowledge of the vehicle code, inattention and speed (for pedestrians and drivers).

The premise of the project is that if we can understand the nature and extent of these factors, we can develop recommendations for individual countermeasures and overall strategies for increasing compliance by both drivers and pedestrians with the vehicle code at crosswalks and mitigating danger when violations occur.

For example, if we learn that people largely understand right-of-way laws, then it would follow that the problem of violations at intersections is largely one of attitude and behavior, and not one of knowledge. In this case, enforcement or risk education efforts strategies may be appropriate. If instead we learn that people do not know the right-of-way laws at intersections, then we could explore a social marketing campaign to educate the public on this. In both of these cases, engineering countermeasures could provide environmental mitigation to support the other efforts.

We will use surveys that will assess driver knowledge, behavior, and perceptions of pedestrian behavior, and vice versa. To assess actual behavior, we will conduct direct observations of drivers and pedestrians at various types of crosswalks across California.

To develop countermeasure recommendations based on the data collected, we will first conduct an intensive review of literature on available and emerging countermeasures for reducing pedestrian injury. The information gathered from the surveys will assist in choosing among deployment strategies.

Along with recommendations for specific countermeasures, we will develop a "best practices" manual, which will discuss conflicts commonly found between pedestrians and drivers at marked and unmarked crosswalks, reasons for these conflicts, and an analysis of which countermeasures or combinations of countermeasures have proven most effective. 

In order to ensure that our findings directly benefit communities in California, the Traffic Safety Center will develop and facilitate a training program for traffic safety practitioners.  We will also prepare a final report, which will interpret the data we have collected and use the results to generate a series of specific interventions recommended to change driver and pedestrian behavior with the goal of reducing pedestrian injury across the state.

TSC Resources

"Driver/Pedestrian Understanding and Behavior at Marked and Unmarked Crosswalks:" an extensive study of pedestrian and driver knowledge of right-of-way laws. Several statistically significant differences in marked versus unmarked crosswalks were identified. Includes research and recommendations and analyses of countermeasures to improve pedestrian crosswalk safety. (July 2007).

"Crosswalk Confusion: Pedestrians and drivers need more information. Or do they?" TSC Online Newsletter, Winter 2006-07.

"What They Don't Know Can Kill Them: More Evidence on Why Pedestrian and Driver Knowledge of the Vehicle Code Should Not Be Assumed." Meghan Fehlig Mitman, David R. Ragland. TSC Research Report. 2007.(also presented at the Annual Meeting of the Transportation Research Board, January 2007).

"When Crosswalks Work—and When They Don't: Charles Zegeer discusses his study on marked vs. unmarked crossings." TSC Online Newsletter. Summer 2006.