Development of the Social Force Model Considering Pedestrian Characteristics and Behavior

Use of pedestrian facilities like sidewalks is influenced by pedestrian characteristics like age, gender, and purpose, for example, walking in social groups, shopping. Helbing and Molnár’s base social force model (SFM) has proven reliable at simulating pedestrian behavior, However, only a small number of simulation models, including SFM and its variations, have concentrated on modeling pedestrian walking while taking into account their traits and behavior. This study’s goal was to simulate bidirectional pedestrian walking behavior by taking into account various pedestrian characteristics (age, gender, behavior) by introducing a novel pedestrian simulation model: the social force model considering pedestrian characteristics and behavior (SFMPCB). Pedestrian gender alone was considered as a modification in our earlier study. The current study also implements a multistep global calibration framework based on a genetic algorithm that takes into account the bidirectional flow of pedestrians from various sidewalks. For calibration and validation, videographic data of pedestrian traffic from four sidewalks in Mumbai, India, were employed. The SFMPCB could be utilized to simulate pedestrian walking on sidewalks reflecting different characteristics and behavior. The quality of service and sidewalk design could also be better studied by utilizing the SFMPCB by generating pedestrian equivalent factors for pedestrian characteristics, similar to passenger car units.