Walking mobility is fundamental to urban sustainability and quality of life in any city, but there are few studies on how pedestrians move through public space and what urban and social factors influence this. A new study by researchers from the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC), the University of Barcelona and the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne (EPFL) has found that, in the case of Barcelona, pedestrian behaviour varies greatly from one neighbourhood to another. Moreover, certain conditions that may contribute to more walking in some parts of the city have the opposite effect in others. This is why researchers warn the administration that inclusive solutions to manage mobility are not well suited to the peculiarities of cities, and in particular those of Barcelona. Therefore, if urban planning is to be improved, it is preferable to implement mobility policies adapted to the context of each neighbourhood.
This is one of the main conclusions of the study "Trends and drivers of pedestrian mobility in Barcelona: A fine-grained study across its commercial tissue" , which has recently been published openly in the scientific journal Cities . The paper is based on the analysis of high-resolution data from 115 people counting sensors, collected over five years at different key points in the city. As one of the most detailed analyses of urban walking mobility in Europe to date, and one of the few in the world, the results provide key information for understanding what influences pedestrian commute and how measures can be implemented to regulate it.
The study provides a detailed look at the evolution of pedestrian flows in Barcelona between 2017 and 2022 - excluding the period of confinement due to the pandemic - and analyses the impact of various urban and social characteristics on walking mobility, which is not homogeneous across the city. "In fact, it varies depending on the combination of different factors, such as the presence of public transport, commercial activity or street arrangement", says Albert Solé, researcher at the Complex Systems group ( PRIMER3 ), from the Digital Transformation, AI and Technology unit, and professor of Multimedia Computing and Telecommunications at UOC.
Three other CoSIN3 researchers, Clément Rames (also associated with the EPFL), Daniel Rhoads and Javier Borge , along with Professor Antoni Meseguer , from the Digital Business research group ( DigiBiz ) of Economics and Business Studies . Sergi Lozano, from the UB's Faculty of Economics and Business and member of the Institute of Complex Systems , took part as well.
The results show an overall increase in pedestrian traffic and also large differences between neighbourhoods: some areas have experienced sustained growth while others show decreases or seasonal patterns. A variability that is configured for up to seven factors that influence walking mobility, such as the number of pedestrian routes, the availability of public transport or the density of neighbourhood shops, among others.
One of the main methodological advances of the study has been the use of spatial regression models that allow us to understand how the impact of each variable changes according to location. "We have noticed that the same factor can have a positive effect in one neighbourhood and a negative effect in another. We therefore propose much more contextualized urban planning that recognizes these local differences. Our models allow us to understand how these factors act differently depending on the area of the city, and this is essential to design more precise and efficient mobility policies", says Albert Solé.
