Planning for sustainable urban mobility: demand estimation of on-street vertical walking facilities

Abstract

The improvement of pedestrian mobility through the use of on-street vertical facilities, i.e. escalators, moving sidewalks, lifts, funiculars and gondola lifts, is becoming increasingly important in many cities with steep slopes that hinder walkers' transit. However, studies on the acceptance, profitability and demand for these facilities are still scarce. The present paper proposes an assessment methodology to evaluate the demand for vertical pedestrian routes and facilities based on diverse accessibility indicators. This methodology was applied to the city of Santander (Spain), where flow measurements and surveys among users of existing vertical walking systems were carried out. These data were modeled using Poisson and Binomial Negative regressions, considering the truncated and discrete character of the dependent variable. The results obtained confirm that vertical walking facilities are highly valued by users. Contrary to expectations, accessibility from these facilities to public services or commercial areas was not relevant to estimate the demand of the existing routes and only accessibility to population proved to be significant. Therefore, it is advisable to install this type of walking facilities in those pedestrian routes located in areas with enough population density over well-equipped central areas, so that the number of potential users justifies their investment and maintenance costs.