The effect of stepping on pedestrian trajectories

• We present a model for pedestrian dynamics based on natural stepping of humans.
• Parsimonious utility functions express the desire to keep distances to walls and other pedestrians.
• The findings from controlled experiments serve for the calibration of the model.
• Increased speed yields smaller angles in change of direction.
• A simulation study of a bottleneck scenario validates the model’s behaviour.

The natural biomechanical motion process of many animals is stepwise. This feature of human movement and other bipeds is largely ignored in simulation models of pedestrians and crowds. We present a concise movement model for pedestrians based on stepwise movement. A series of controlled experiments was conducted to calibrate the model based on individual behaviour of pedestrians. We find that a change of direction is constrained by the current walking speed: the higher the speed the smaller the possible change of direction. Additionally, we present the trajectories and distances subjects held to a wall when walking around a corner. We use this result as a parameter for the simulation model. Finally, we validate the model’s behaviour with an egress scenario with a corridor as bottleneck. The resulting trajectories show behaviour that has been found in controlled experiments with similar set-ups: if there is enough space, individuals try to walk in the middle of the corridor, but when a congestion is present multiple lanes form allowing for higher pedestrian flow. The model separates the behavioural aspects from biomechanical movement thus facilitating expandability and allowing experts to focus on their respective fields of expertise.