The effect of infrastructural nudging on cylcist route choice

Abstract

Cyclist route choice can lead to uncomfortable and dangerous situations. Therefore, it is important to research ways to influence this. This study explores how infrastructural nudging can be used to influence cyclist route choice. Using virtual reality and a bicycle simulator the impact of visual road hierarchy, visual obstruction and herding through street art is studied. A virtual urban environment was designed with 11 T-intersections. In 9 of the 11 intersection these methods were applied in three different ways, to see whether the nudge impacted cyclist route choice. The gathered data was then analysed with descriptive data analysis and discrete choice modelling. This study shows that cyclists follow nudges using visual road hierarchy and herding. However, they do not follow nudges with visual obstruction. This effect is the same for people of all ages, genders, heights etc. Though less experienced cyclists seem to react more heavily to obstruction methods. The results also indicate that cyclists have a significant right-handed tendency. This effect is not influenced by eye or hand dominance. The effect becomes slightly weaker when nudging is applied but does not go away. Future research should validate these results in a physical environment before this is used in practice.