Movement characteristics of heterogeneous crowd with multi-type disabilities from a single-file movement perspective

As urban public spaces and transportation hubs witness increasing participation of individuals with diverse disabilities, understanding the movement characteristics of heterogeneous crowd with multi-type disabilities has become critical for crowd safety and risk prevention in infrastructure. Employing a series of single-file movement experiments, this paper explores the macroscopic and microscopic movement characteristics of heterogeneous crowds involving persons with multi-type of disabilities (wheelchair users, hearing, physical, intellectual and mental impairments), and movement differences with the elderly group. Research findings reveal that heterogeneous crowds with multiple disability types (<8% wheelchair users) utilize space efficiently and exhibit free velocity comparable to the elderly group. Disabled pedestrians tend to walk along the inner edge of semicircular corridors, while the elderly group tends to walk along the outer edge for stability. And, heterogeneous crowds containing multiple wheelchair users require substantial safety distances. Lane separation evacuation strategies can be considered based on these differences. Gait study reveals that the elderly group responds to congestion by increasing their step frequency (1.38 steps/s). Heterogeneous crowds with few wheelchair users combine slight step frequency changes and moderate body sway, but as the number of wheelchair users increases, they move to amplifying sway amplitude to adjust space. Although most design codes presume that crowds self-regulate by altering step frequency, this mechanism fails when high ratio of wheelchair users are present. Our findings can refine traffic design and crowd management strategies, better aligning them with real-world scenarios, also providing empirical support for emergency evacuation planning and traffic risk prevention in infrastructure.