This paper describes the evaluation of a central city safety campaign designed to decrease red light crossing by pedestrians and encourage left turning drivers to give way to pedestrians. Five intersections were saturated with visual media and a schedule of interactive footpath mime and rewards for safe behaviour. The proportion of pedestrians crossing on the red light almost halved from 6.61% before to 3.63% after the campaign. Red light crossing rates were also significantly lower when the footpath mime was being conducted (2.42%) compared to when it was not (4.73%). No improvements were found in driver behaviour. A pre/post attitude survey indicated high awareness of the campaign and some knowledge improvement, but no change to general attitudes. It is suggested that the footpath mime, which drew onlookers' attention to pedestrians crossing on the red, may have created psychological barriers to unsafe behaviour that were reinforced by the saturation of visually salient messaging. (A) "Reprinted with permission from Elsevier".
Abstract