Modelling active travel accessibility at the micro-scale using multi-source built environment data

Abstract

Accessibility models explore how land use and transport systems interact to facilitate access to activities and daily needs. Existing applications generally model accessibility based on distance or travel time. For pedestrians and cyclists, the street-level environment (e.g., green visibility, streetside amenities, dedicated infrastructure) significantly influences people's willingness and ability to travel. Incorporating these features into accessibility models can help them to be more representative of active travellers' experienced environment.

This study presents a methodology for incorporating the street-level environment into active mode accessibility. First, micro-scale built environment data from multiple sources are harmonised into a high-resolution digital representation of the land use and transport system. Second, a compute-optimised framework is developed for modelling accessibility at the micro-scale (i.e., each dwelling separately) incorporating the street-level environment. The methods build upon the open geodatabase OpenStreetMap and open-source MATSim project, facilitating expandability and transferability to other contexts. We apply this methodology to develop policy-relevant accessibility indicators for Greater Manchester.

In the results, we observe that the street-level environment can cause accessibility indicators to vary at the micro-scale, especially in less connected neighbourhoods where the choice of routes is limited. We also observed that for cyclists, the accessibility advantage over walking reduces substantially when traffic stress is considered. Our findings support further adoption of micro-scale built environment data and high-resolution analysis methods for active travel accessibility modelling in research and practice.