Women-Oriented Evaluation of Perceived Safety of Walking Routes between Home and Mass Transit: A Case Study and Methodology Test in Guangzhou

Abstract

Streets are an essential element of urban safety governance and urban design, but they are designed with little regard for possible gender differences. This study proposes a safety perception evaluation method from the female perspective based on street view images (SVIs) and mobile phone data, taking the central city of Guangzhou as an example. The method relies on crowdsourced data and uses a machine learning model to predict the safety perception map. It combines the simulation of women’s walking commuting paths to analyse the areas that need to be prioritised for improvement. Multiple linear regression was used to explain the relationship between safety perception and visual elements. The results showed the following: (1) There were differences in safety perceptions across genders. Women gave overall lower safety scores and a more dispersed distribution of scores. (2) Approximately 11% of the streets in the study area showed weak perceived safety, and approximately 3% of these streets have high pedestrian flows and require priority improvements. (3) Safe visual elements in SVIs included the existence of roads, sidewalks, cars, railways, people, skyscrapers, and trees. Our findings can help urban designers determine how to evaluate urban safety and where to optimise key areas. Both have practical implications for urban planners seeking to create urban environments that promote greater safety.