City West PSP (Public Shared Path) will sooner or later require some treatment to facilitate safer interaction between cyclists travelling on the PSP and pedestrians crossing it to get to West Perth or walking along the path to get to Harbour Town shopping area.

Cyclists not giving way to pedestrians. Is this an accident waiting to happen?

Possibilities are

• flashing lights when the train arrives to alert cyclists to the impending appearance of pedestrians on the footpath
• the removal of the zebra crossing to make pedestrians stop
• changed surface treatment (i.e. brick paving)
• structural measures that create a slow point (as is being trialed near Trigg)
• or some type of a small mixed use plaza.

Currently the relevant authorities have no design or deadline to tackle this.

Anybody who has relevant photos/video of that stretch and is happy for it to go on this page can send it, preferably as an .avi file on a DVD for video, or .jpg for photos.

The following measurements were taken by MainRoads WA on the 24.7.09 (Friday, in fine weather)

City West PSP Observations of Traffic Measurement (24.7.09)

• About the same number of cyclists travel East and West every a day (428 vs 429)
• Similar numbers of pedestrians cross the PSP (North and South). 359 people in the mornings Vs. 411 in the evening

It would be reasonable to expect a similar number of close interactions between pedestrians and cyclists, but in fact there are only 16 close interactions in the morning, 4 during the day and 8 in the evening. But there are 56 pedestrians travelling the PSP in the morning, whilst there are 211 in the evening.

Cyclists are about six times faster than pedestrians which means that in the evening cyclists commuting West from the city encounter and are slowed down by pedestrians, and therefore approach the crossing slower and with pedestrians in mind. It would be interesting to measure the average speed of cyclist in the morning and the evening.

It would appear that the more pedestrians there are, the safer it is for them. This supports the observations that the more cyclists are on the road, the safer the road becomes for cyclists.

The interactions at the pedestrian crossing can be seen here.