When designing and constructing infrastructure that serves large volumes of people, one of the main design considerations is pedestrian flow. This influences user experience, the efficiency of the asset, and may also influence revenue in the case of concession or ticket queues.

For that reason, constructors are often locked into predetermined layouts without the flexibility to alter anything because it may “impact pedestrian flow.” On recent projects, Entuitive has demonstrated that pedestrian modelling is a tool that constructors can use to help quantify pedestrian movement and demonstrate that their proposals meet or exceed the required level of performance, allowing them to be more innovative and competitive.

Value Engineering

Good constructors are known for being creative and finding options for delivering a project more economically. On infrastructure projects with large pedestrian volumes moving through them, these innovative ideas can often be dismissed by other project stakeholders because they appear to impact pedestrian movement. In this case, pedestrian modelling can be leveraged to determine if the proposal does in fact negatively impact the user experience and quantify this impact to support value engineering proposals.

On a large transit project in Toronto, the Reference Concept Design (RCD) included several structural elements that were transferred above a concourse area. This structural transfer was of course very expensive and had a large schedule impact. It was proposed to not transfer several elements; to let them go through the concourse with a far more efficient load path.

While this proposal seems obvious, it was met with resistance because all modelling to date had included an open concourse and the columns were thought to impact pedestrian movement. Strategically, our team developed a dynamic pedestrian model on behalf of the constructor for both the baseline scheme and proposed scheme so that the impact could be compared. This dynamic model allowed both schemes to be visualized and quantified and allowed for an informed discussion to take place with all project stakeholders. Ultimately, the proposal was accepted, and this resulted in a far more competitive bid to be submitted.

Above: Baseline layout (left), and constructor’s proposal with additional items in red (right).

Above: Sample Level of Service output for baseline layout (left) and constructor proposal (right).

Construction Sequencing

Not only are constructors innovative with finding optimal final solutions, they also provide value throughout the construction process by finding the most efficient sequencing. In the case of existing buildings or new construction that is adjacent to public areas, construction hoarding must also be considered and will be specific to each construction stage.

Pedestrian modelling can again be leveraged to show that the pedestrian flow during each proposed construction stage meets the required level of performance. This is typically quantified with Level of Service, travel time, and emergency evacuation times. The pedestrian flow can also be visualized for each construction stage, allowing stakeholders to better understand the impact of construction on their users.

The example below shows a transit development where Entuitive modelled three construction stages to determine how the station performed throughout. Each stage had different combinations of platform and concourse areas that were open or closed, different train schedules for those platforms that remained opened, and different layouts of construction hoarding throughout the station. For each, it could be shown that pedestrian flow met performance requirements, which improved stakeholder buy-in.

Above: Sample construction stage analysis with resulting Level of Service.

Existing guidelines had minimum clearances that had to be maintained. However, those resulted in onerous hoarding conditions for construction that were not reasonable in an existing, confined station. Here as well, pedestrian modelling demonstrated that areas of the station that saw relatively little foot traffic could deviate from these guidelines with careful monitoring during construction.

Integrating Pedestrian Modelling & Construction Engineering

Constructors are known for being innovative and finding the optimal solution to a problem. Pedestrian modelling can be a useful tool in that process to prove that pedestrian flow has been considered.

When pursuing work, this can allow constructors to propose thoughtful deviations from requirements imposed by stakeholders, Output Specifications, or RCD’s, and prove that their proposal meets the performance requirements. As part of an integrated team, this allows for more freedom to optimize and allows for more competitive pursuits.

To learn more about how Entuitive can support a constructors’ work through pedestrian modelling, reach out to Matt Smith.