Educational campaign for improving pedestrian safety: a university campus study

Florida is the state with the highest pedestrian fatality rate per unit population in the U.S. In addition to engineering countermeasures, educational efforts directed to pedestrians and other road users are equally important for improving pedestrian safety. To explore educational formats and identify effective educational methods, the Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) sponsored a pilot program called"Bulls Walk and Bike Week Campaign" on the Tampa campus of the University of South Florida (USF). A before-and-after comparison study was designed to evaluate the effectiveness of this campaign. In the study, observational surveys and a questionnaire survey were conducted to compare the surrogate measures of safety performance of the campus before and after the campaign. Observational survey outcomes show that roadway safety on campus improved after the campaign. The improvement is most siginificant for the site closest to the location where the majority of campaign activities took place. This suggests the necessity of seeking a spatial balance between concentrated and distributed campaign structures for optimal exposure to the campaign, especially when the budget of the campaign is limited and time is constrained. The analysis results of the questionnaire survey show that respondents as pedestrians, bicyclists, and drivers have different perceptions on driver yielding behaviors towards pedestrians and bicyclists. Contrasting points of view of different types of road users warrant careful and distinct designs of educational measures intended for different users. More respondents perceived that USF is a pedestrian/bicyclist-friendly campus after the campaign. It is suggested that a longitudinal survey should be conducted to follow up the effectiveness evaluation, and a cost-effective method should be further explored to continue the campaign efforts.