A Reliability-Based Analysis of Bicyclist Red-Light Running Behavior at Urban Intersections

This paper describes the red-light running behavior of bicyclists at urban intersections based on reliability analysis approach. Bicyclists’ crossing behavior was collected by video recording. Four proportional hazard models by the Cox, exponential, Weibull, and Gompertz distributions were proposed to analyze the covariate effects on safety crossing reliability. The influential variables include personal characteristics, movement information, and situation factors. The results indicate that the Cox hazard model gives the best description of bicyclists’ red-light running behavior. Bicyclists’ safety crossing reliabilities decrease as their waiting times increase. There are about 15.5% of bicyclists with negligible waiting times, who are at high risk of red-light running and very low safety crossing reliabilities. The proposed reliability models can capture the covariates’ effects on bicyclists’ crossing behavior at signalized intersections. Both personal characteristics and traffic conditions have significant effects on bicyclists’ safety crossing reliability. A bicyclist is more likely to have low safety crossing reliability and high violation risk when more riders are crossing against the red light, and they wait closer to the motorized lane. These findings provide valuable insights in understanding bicyclists’ violation behavior; and their implications in assessing bicyclists’ safety crossing reliability were discussed.