Assessing the Accessibility of Cycling Infrastructure for Wheelchair Users: Insights from an On-Road Experiment and Online Questionnaire Study

Abstract

In this paper, we pay significant attention to the most vulnerable road users (i.e., people with disabilities) when interacting with cyclists. The special needs of these groups are studied by distributing an online questionnaire about their perception and interaction with cyclists besides conducting an on-road experiment to test the possibility of sharing cycling infrastructure with wheelchair users. In an authentic case study, 2 cyclists and 5 wheelchair users were asked to ride their vehicles on a cycling lane in Madrid, in order to evaluate wheelchair users’ interaction with cyclists and reaction to the infrastructure by applying objective and subjective measures. The participants were provided with GPS, a speed sensor, and a head-mounted camera to record the experiment. The results show that people with disabilities feel threatened by cyclists who share the sidewalk with them; the respondents to the questionnaire suggested making the sidewalk free of cyclists to avoid conflict and improve safety. Moreover, the outputs of the experiment show positive feedback from wheelchair users when sharing cycling infrastructure regarding the improvement of speed and safety feeling. However, it is recommended to increase the number of wheelchair users to obtain more reliable and generalizable results.