In winter pedestrian settings of northern regions like Hokkaido, it is animportant issue to get rid of the risk of mobility difficulty and to prevent falls caused by extremely slippery walking surface and footway-side snow storage in winter. There are fewer evaluation studies on winter pedestrian mobility than on summer pedestrian mobility. A mobility evaluation considering pedestrians' preference was undertaken in order to understand theeffects of winter pedestrian footway maintenance. The mobility evaluationwas conducted using "Conjoint Analysis" widely used in marketing research. The analysis has compared if the different weather conditions in different regions bring any distinction between the pedestrian needs, and if the service level difference in winter maintenance brings any distinction between the thought of pedestrians. Besides, by employing the conjoint analysis available to recognize the effectiveness for the specific group, each ofthe different age groups was assessed since it was assumed that old people would have severe opinion toward feeling comfortable walking. The study results show that it is possible to understand pedestrian needs for wintermaintenance according to factors specifying winter mobility by employing the conjoint analysis. Especially, it is possible to quantify different pedestrian needs in relation to regional circumstances, such as weather conditions, and to quantify difference in valid factors upon diverse age groups. For the covering abstract see ITRD E143097.
Abstract