Understanding and Using New Pedestrian and Bicycle Facilities [Traffic Tech]
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Summary
This report addresses the rising trend of pedestrian and bicyclist fatalities in the United States, which increased by 46% and 38%, respectively, between 2011 and 2020. While infrastructure and engineering countermeasures are critical components of safety programs, many innovative facilities—such as leading pedestrian intervals, rectangular rapid flashing beacons, and contraflow bike lanes—are new to road users. The primary research question focuses on how pedestrians, bicyclists, and drivers understand and use these facilities, aiming to develop better communication strategies to improve safety and reduce injuries. To investigate this, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration conducted a systematic literature review of 114 articles covering 17 specific facilities from domestic and international sources. The review was organized by primary road user type and analyzed findings across four components: use, compliance, and safety; attitudes, beliefs, and perceptions; knowledge and comprehension; and education strategies. Additionally, the team reviewed current U.S. public outreach practices by sampling national, state, and local agencies and advocacy groups to identify gaps in knowledge regarding effective educational dissemination. The findings indicate that research depth varies significantly by facility, with most studies focusing on use and safety rather than education or enforcement. Generally, road users navigate new facilities safely, though not always as intended; for instance, motorists may fail to yield appropriately, but pedestrians and bicyclists often take precautions to avoid injury. Confusion arises when user expectations differ from reality, particularly with facilities that alter movement patterns, such as bike boxes. Pedestrians and bicyclists generally hold positive attitudes toward these facilities, citing improved safety and reduced delays, whereas motorists share these sentiments only if they do not perceive inconvenience or unexpected behaviors. Regarding outreach, the review found that while local agencies handle much of the educational work, larger organizations tend to provide broad safety messages. Multichannel communication targeted at highly localized audiences was identified as the most successful strategy for behavioral change, though few studies have scientifically evaluated these campaigns. Enforcement activities, such as visible patrols or citations, are likely to improve compliance but remain under-documented in the research community. The significance of this report lies in its synthesis of current knowledge to guide the development of more effective countermeasure programs. It highlights a critical need for more research to quantify the success of educational campaigns and to explore intuitive design principles or media campaigns that can better communicate facility usage to road users. By improving public understanding of these new infrastructure elements, the report aims to support efforts to reduce pedestrian and bicyclist fatalities.
Key finding
Multichannel communication directed at highly localized audiences is identified as the most successful strategy for improving safety through behavioral change regarding new pedestrian and bicycle facilities.
Methodology
review
Sample size: 114
Provenance
The full processing record for this entry. Every stage of this paper's journey through the pipeline is logged — what ran, with which tool and model, how many attempts it took, and when it last completed. Discovered via bulk_ingest_rosap on 2026-05-23 (6 acquisition events logged).
| Stage | Outcome | Tool | Model | Prompt | Attempts | Completed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| discover | success | rosap | — | — | 2 | 2026-05-23 |
| archive | success | — | — | — | 1 | 2026-05-23 |
| extract | success | cached | — | — | 2 | 2026-06-10 |
| clean | success | — | — | — | 1 | 2026-06-01 |
| chunk | success | — | — | — | 1 | 2026-06-01 |
| embed | success | — | — | — | 1 | 2026-06-02 |
| enrich | success | — | — | — | 1 | 2026-05-23 |
| promote | success | — | — | — | 1 | 2026-05-23 |
| summarize | success | llm | qwen3.6-27b-prismaquant | summ-v5 | 3 | 2026-06-10 |
| tag | success | vector_similarity | — | — | 19 | 2026-06-11 |
| verify | success | — | — | — | 2 | 2026-06-10 |
Summary generated by qwen3.6-27b-prismaquant on 2026-06-10; verification: verified.
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- Applied Guidance: countermeasure evaluation