To be able to travel efficiently and safely, cyclists have to interact with other road users and the infrastructure, which is often more adapted to car traffic than to cyclists’ needs. Just like other road users, cyclists use communication devices such as mobile phones in traffic. Cyclists are a heterogeneous group, where knowledge, physical ability, personality factors and the motive for the trip are determining factors for how a cyclist moves through traffic. Therefore, in this study it is investigated how different types of cyclists adapt their behaviour to both the infrastructure and other traffic, when cycling with and without interacting with a mobile phone. In a semi-controlled field study, 41 participants cycled a 3 kilometer long route twice, once while listening to music, and once without. Each cyclist also received three text messages along the route. The cyclist was asked to deal with them in a naturalistic manner, choosing whether, when and how to answer. He or she was also free to choose one’s speed and path along the route, be it on the road, the cycle path or the pedestrian pavement. The cyclist’s gaze direction and speed was logged, and two cameras on the cyclist’s bike and one on a following experimenter’s bike recorded the traffic situation around the cyclist. The participants were divided into four cyclist groups based on a self-rating about how one’s normal travel speed on transport journeys compared to other cyclists’ speed. Fast cyclists typically are faster than most others, so-called normal cyclists travel at average speed, and comfort cyclists report to cycle more slowly than most other people. An additional group of e-bikers was recruited based solely on the fact that they owned an e-bike, regardless of reported travel speed. It was common for the cyclists to ignore incoming text messages, or to answer them only at the next necessary stop. Only a third of all incoming texts was read and answered while cycling. Also when texting, the cyclists almost never missed to direct their attention to the areas that were classified as necessary according to the MiRA (Minimum Required Attention) theory of attention. To which cyclist group one belonged did not have a big influence on how text messages were handled while cycling. Listening to music influenced the cyclists’ speed differently, depending on the cyclist group. Attention and reported workload was not influenced by group. The design of the infrastructure proved to be a determining factor for the cyclists’ efficiency, and the experienced delay varied with cyclist group. Fast cyclists and e-bikers were delayed more in situations that required a stop regardless of the traffic situation, and comfort cyclists were delayed the most in a mixed-traffic roundabout, that was hard to interpret. In this situation, many of the cyclists expressed that they felt unsure about which route they were intended to use, and a fear about being in mixed traffic. Around 40 percent of the cyclists chose to cycle on the pedestrian pavement instead of on the road, where there was no dedicated cyclist infrastructure. Interviews and think-aloud protocols revealed that the main reason for pavement cycling was the experienced fear to cycle in mixed traffic, where cars were felt to have a higher rank of power. The study showed that it is necessary to consider the heterogeneity of cyclists and their different preconditions when planning traffic infrastructure. Just how cyclists adapt to the infrastructure based on their own capabilities, they also adapt their interaction with mobile phones, such that the attentional demands of the situations occurring in this study could be fulfilled anyway. (Author/publisher)
Samenvatting