Evaluation of Pedestrians' Perceptions of Sidewalk Quality in Chattogram City's Major Areas

Abstract

To reduce traffic congestion and road
accidents sidewalks play a vital part.
Developed countries are building automatic
sidewalks for their pedestrians. According to
US data, the current world population is
about 8 billion and the population growth
rate is 0.88%. There are not enough roads for
such a large population. Moreover, with the
increase in world population, traffic jams are
increasing in all countries of the world so
developed countries are encouraging their
pedestrians to use sidewalks. They are
making sidewalks user-friendly. They
maintain the minimum standard size of the
footpath. So, common people are comfortable
using more sidewalks. Hence, Walking is
gradually becoming the best transport tool all
across the world. The purpose of this research
is to analyze the quality of the sidewalks in
major areas of Chattogram Metropolitan City
(CMC). Freeport, Customs (Chattogram
Port), Agrabad, Tigerpass, GEC, 2 No. gate,
Muradpur, and Bahaddarhat are known as
the busiest, most industrial, and most
important places for CMC. A study involving
720 participants found that Tigerpass and
GEC Circle are the most user-friendly
footpaths, with 62-68% of respondents
deeming them usable. Agrabad, Customs, and
Free Port areas have the least usable
sidewalks, with 22%, 27%, and 30% usable
respectively. However, 48.75% of respondents
believe that the presence of hawkers and
shops on footpaths makes people reluctant to
use them. 45% believe that footpaths are not
properly maintained and unclean, and
44.37% find the dimensions of footpaths
narrow. 78% of women refrain from using
sidewalks at night due to safety concerns. The
survey also revealed that GEC, Bahaddarhat,
and Customs are the most-rated footpaths,
while Muradpur, No. 2 Gate, and Free Port
are the lowest-rated. As people become
disinterested in using footpaths, they walk on
the road instead, potentially causing
accidents. To make sidewalks more userfriendly,
51% suggested making sidewalks
free of hawkers, 70% discussed security
improvement, 44% mentioned increasing
lighting, and 36.31% mentioned regular
maintenance and cleaning. Analyzing the
results of this study will give a clear idea
about the current sidewalk quality of
Chittagong City and with it; several negative
ideas will be born. What the rest of the city's
sidewalks will look like can be inferred
from this study.