By Leslie Vasquez Guzman
How a street feels can matter just as much as how it’s physically built. A new study shows that emotional perceptions about whether a street seems inviting, secure, or rundown can help explain safety for people walking or biking—a reminder that planners should think beyond conventional design standards. Road designers should also consider the character and aesthetics of the spaces they create.
Using nine years of crash data from Hartford, Connecticut, researchers explored how a place’s look and feel—like whether it is viewed as lively or boring—had any relationship to the frequency of crashes involving walkers, bikers, and other non-motorized road users. They analyzed over 1,500 crash locations involving non-motorists using 360-degree street-view images, with each location assigned perception scores based on whether participants saw it as beautiful, safe, boring, depressing, lively, or wealthy.
The researchers’ findings showed that people’s feelings about a place were strongly tied to safety outcomes. Streets seen as beautiful, safe, or wealthy were associated with fewer crashes, even after accounting for road design and neighborhood demographics. Streets perceived as boring or depressing were associated with more crashes, along with “lively” streets.
There are a few possible explanations for these patterns. For example, places perceived as lively may have more activity, and therefore more opportunities for crashes. Boring or depressing environments may lead to lower vigilance from drivers or pedestrians. On the other hand, areas that feel beautiful or wealthy may reflect other social and infrastructure investments that reduce risk.
The influence of these perceptions also changed depending on how much of the surrounding area was considered. Some apply strongest to specific areas, such as intersections or single blocks, while other perceptions reflect how the overall feel of a block or neighborhood can influence safety at a broader scale.
Ultimately, the study shows that documenting how a place feels can offer planners a new scalable, data-driven way to bring subjective experiences into safety and transportation analysis. As the authors put it,
By incorporating the perceptual dimensions into crash analysis, stakeholders in the planning and transportation sectors can develop targeted, street-level interventions to enhance road safety.
Photo credit: Kristina Volgenau on Unsplash. License.