title: Features of pedestrian behavior in car-to-pedestrian contact situations in near-miss incidents in Japan.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  The objective of this study is to evaluate the severe conditions between car-to-pedestrian near-miss situations using pedestrian time-to-vehicle (pedestrian TTV) which is the time when the pedestrian would reach the forward moving car line.
  
  
  METHODS
  Since the information available from the real-world accidents was limited, the authors focused on the near-miss situations captured by driving recorders installed in passenger cars. In their previous study, the authors found there were some similarities between accidents and near-miss incidents. It was made clear that the situations in pedestrians' accidents could be estimated from the near-miss incident data which included motion pictures capturing pedestrian behaviors. In their previous study, the vehicle time-to-collision (vehicle TTC) was investigated from the near-miss incident data. The authors analyzed data for 101 near-miss car-to-pedestrian incident events in which pedestrians were crossing the roads in front of a forward-moving car at an intersection or on a straight road. Using a video of near-miss car-to-pedestrian incidents captured by drive recorders and collected by the Society of Automotive Engineers of Japan (J-SAE) from 2005 to 2009, the pedestrian TTV was calculated. Based on the calculated pedestrian TTV, one of the severe conditions between car-to-pedestrian near-miss situations was evaluated for pedestrians who emerged from behind an obstruction such as a building, a parked vehicle and a moving vehicle.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Focusing on the cases of the pedestrians who emerged from behind an obstruction, the averages of the vehicle TTC and pedestrian TTV were 1.31 and 1.05 seconds, respectively, and did not demonstrate a significant difference. Since the averages of the vehicle TTC and pedestrian TTV were similar, there would be a higher possibility of the contact between a car and pedestrian if the driver and pedestrian were not paying any attention.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The authors propose that a moving speed of a pedestrian surrogate "dummy" should be determined considering the near-miss incident situations for the evaluation of a CDMBS for pedestrian detection. The authors also propose that the time-to-collision of the dummy to the tested car during the evaluation of the performance of the CDMBS for pedestrian detection should be determined considering the time such as the vehicle TTC in this study. Additionally or alternatively, the pedestrian TTV should be considered, in which the worst situation was assumed for a car that was moving toward a pedestrian without braking due to the car driver's inattentiveness and the pedestrian not slowing down their walking speed or stopping.
authors.affiliation: Vehicle Safety Research Department, National Traffic Safety and Environment Laboratory, Chofu, Tokyo, Japan. ymatsui@ntsel.go.jp
authors.forename: Yasuhiro
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Matsui
authors.forename: Masahito
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Hitosugi
authors.forename: Tsutomu
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Doi
authors.forename: Shoko
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Oikawa
authors.forename: Kunio
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Takahashi
authors.forename: Kenichi
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Ando
mesh_terms: D000054:Acceleration; D000063:Accidents, Traffic / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D001288:Attention; D006801:Humans; D007564:Japan; D013997:Time Factors; D014741:Video Recording; D016138:Walking / Q000293:injuries / Q000523:psychology*