NSW Branch Pedestrian Planning Seminar, Sydney

Eric Rivers of Arup and John Webster of WSP combined to present an evening seminar on the applications of pedestrian planning and its interactions with pedestrian modelling. It was an excellent meeting giving practical insight and examples. The 75 people who attended had many questions and enjoyed the extensive catering provided by Arup in their new and state of the art Sydney office. There were two valuable take home messages - pedestrian modelling is a strong tool but should be used with caution for special situations (an example being a "linear" opera presented on a very long elevated walkway in New York City where performers were stationary but the huge audience walked) and that calculated pedestrian levels of service figures can vary widely if inappropriate time averaging and study restrictions are applied.