| While the rapid urbanization of China has made great achievements,it has inevitably brought about various social and economic problems and challenges,such as traffic congestion,environmental pollution and other "urban diseases".Pedestrian traffic is one of the effective ways to solve urban traffic congestion and the deterioration of the urban environment.It has received more and more attention in recent years.At the national level,in 2016,the State Council issued "Several Opinions on Further Strengthening the Management of Urban Planning and Construction",which mentioned that the construction of the pedestrian system should be strengthened and green travel should be promoted.In 2017,the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development issued the "Guiding Opinions on Strengthening Ecological Restoration of Urban Rehabilitation Work",which requires "repair urban functions and improve environmental quality" and "encourage urban residents to walk and use bicycles to travel".In response to the policy call of the central government,the General Office of the People’s Government of the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region issued the “Notice of the General Office of the People’s Government of the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region on Deepening Urban Traffic Management Matters” in 2017,which emphasized the adoption of “guiding green and low-carbon travel”,“improving the quality of sidewalks”,and "building pedestrian crossing facilities" to support the improvement of the pedestrian environment.Walking is the most sustainable form of physical activity in people’s daily life.The relationship between walking behavior with the built environment is a hot topic in urban planning,urban geography and other disciplines.In the existing research,the perception of the built environment has been confirmed to be related to walking behavior.Further research has found that self-selection effects,such as travel attitudes and preferences,may play an important role in the correlation between perception of the built environment and walking behavior.However,the role of self-selection effects in the correlation between the two has not been fully studied.In this context,taking Dazhao community in Hohhot as a case,this thesis uses statistical description analysis to measure the characteristics of travel attitudes and preferences of local residents,the built environment perception and walking behavior.This thesis also uses regression analysis to control the self-selection effect to analyze the impact of built environment perception on walking behavior quantitatively,and explore the influence mechanism of walking behavior.Firstly,this research sorts out the related theories and research trends of the characteristics of built environment perception,walking behavior and the factors of walking behavior systematically.The built environment perception,travel attitudes and preferences,and residents’ social and economic attributes are incorporated into the theoretical framework of the walking behavior influence mechanism,which lays a theoretical foundation for the empirical research of the thesis and the construction of an optimized strategy system.Firstly,this research systematically sorts out the related theories and research trends of the characteristics of perceived built environment,walking behavior and their influencing factors.The perceived built environment,travel attitudes and preferences,and residents’ social and economic attributes are incorporated into the theoretical framework of the factors walking behavior,which lays a theoretical foundation for the empirical research of the thesis and the construction of an optimized strategy system.Secondly,this thesis reveals the influence mechanism of personal social and economic attributes,travel attitudes and preferences,and perceived built environment on walking behavior.(1)In terms of walking behavior,referencing to the International Physical Activity Questionnaire,this thesis divides walking behavior into traffic walking and leisure walking according to the purpose of travel.This thesis investigates the number of days for the two types of walking activities from the home of respondents to destinations around the community.Among them,traffic walking is a kind of trip for utilitarian purposes,while leisure walking pays attention to the importance of walking itself.Analysis shows that most respondents walk 4 times a week,and the walking frequency of the two types of walking is quite different.(2)As for personal social and economic attributes,this research conducted a statistical analysis of the respondents’ personal characteristics such as gender,age,marital status,ethnicity,education level,occupation,family monthly income and length of residence,and explored their relationship with walking behavior.The analysis found that the lower the educational background,the longer the residence time,and the smaller the family size,the more frequent the traffic and leisure walking of respondents.In addition,the older respondents and the respondents who do not have driving licenses tend to participate in more traffic walking.(3)This thesis controls the self-selection effect by controlling the variables of travel attitude and preference.The variables of travel attitude and preference include like walking,like riding a bicycle,like public transportation,and like private cars.The study found that respondents who like to walk and travel by public transport have a higher frequency of traffic and leisure walking.(4)In terms of the perceived built environment,this thesis proposes six principles that helps to build a pedestrian-friendly environment,including convenience,connectivity,intentionality,comfort,pleasure,and safety.This thesis also measures the perceived built environment by referencing the Neighbourhood Environmental Walkability Survey,and deletes some known problems.After the measurement has passed the reliability and validity test,this thesis first uses the principal component analysis method to reduce the dimensionality of the six principles to extract comprehensive indicators.Secondly,through the correlation analysis,the six dimensions of the built environment have a strong correlation and passed the significance test(P<0.05).Subsequently,the basic social and economic attributes such as age,gender,employment,and income are subjected to an independent sample T test to analyze the differences between the residents’ social and economic attributes and the perception of the built environment.It is found that the six-dimensional perception measurement of the built environment has significant differences among people with different educational backgrounds and different per capita monthly incomes.Finally,the regression analysis of built environment perception and walking behavior found that the convenience,comfort and safety of built environment perception affect both leisure walking and traffic walking,while intentionality only affects traffic walking.Thirdly,travel attitudes and preferences were included as control variables into the regression model of perceived built environment and walking behavior,and then social and economic attributes such as age and gender were included as controls in all regression models,and insignificant variables were gradually removed to maintain the model.Simplicity,while avoiding the problem of multicollinearity.After controlling for the self-selection effect,the perceived built environment still has a significant impact on the frequency of leisure walking and traffic walking,and affects traffic walking and leisure walking from different dimensions.Among them,convenience and safety have a significant positive effect on leisure walking frequency.For traffic and walking frequency,the main factors that have an impact are convenience,connectivity,intentionality and comfort.The frequency of traffic walking and leisure walking are both significantly affected by the perceived convenience of the built environment.This also shows that the convenience of walking to daily service facilities plays an important role in promoting walking travel.In addition,self-selection factors have a significant impact on the correlation between perception of the built environment and walking behavior.Therefore,planning strategies to increase the frequency of walking by improving the built environment may be affected by residents’ travel attitudes and preferences.Lastly,this research suggests that local governments,policy makers,urban planning practitioners,and community residents work together to optimize the community’s built environment from the three levels of community planning,environmental construction and management mechanisms.In terms of planning and positioning,it has shifted from "paying attention to the passage of motor vehicles" to "paying attention to the walking environment and lifestyle of residents." In terms of environmental construction,the following five construction methods are used to optimize the walking environment of the community: improve the construction of public service facilities and give full play to the configuration efficiency of the facilities;increase the density and connectivity of the road network,optimize the pedestrian network;promote the micro-renovation and update of the community,and build a level Equipped with a reasonable green space system;improve walking infrastructure,build a walk-friendly community;promote neighborhood communication and safety,and improve residents’ satisfaction.In terms of management mechanism,the public sector should increase the construction of public transportation and reasonably control the scale of tourism.In addition,encourage the holding of some social activities,such as place-making activities and educational activities that change perceptions,in order to shape residents’ views and attitudes towards the built environment,enhance entertainment and communication,and encourage walking. |
