Accompanying the road user : looking for new ways to get into contact with road users. Infrastructure is made for users. Drivers of vehicles, captains on board of a ship, they are all experts because of their use of infrastructure. Rijkswaterstaat explores this expert judgement more and more while making policies. There are several methods available for defining the users’ opinions. There is a continuous search for new methods to grasp the opinion and experience of (road) users. This paper contains a description of the first application of the method ‘accompanying the road user’. It can be described as a ‘in-vehicle field approach’. A researcher joins the respondent (=driver) on its way to the destination. The respondent is free to talk; there is no topic guideline. Results of the project are mentioned as well as some of the lessons that we learned. People are willing to participate and to share their experiences. Based on the positive results new projects will be started with even more invasive methods of research. (Author/publisher)
Abstract