Modeling and Simulation of Pedestrian Counter Flow on a Crosswalk

A cellular automaton model for pedestrian flow based on floor field is extended to take the effects of those walkers in the same and opposite directions into account simultaneously when they are in the view field of a walker, i.e., walkers tend to follow the leaders in the same direction and avoid conflicts with those opposite. Pedestrian counter flows on a crosswalk are investigated by the improved model under open boundary conditions. Numerical simulations show that lane formation is well reproduced and this process is pretty quick, which coincides with real pedestrian traffic. It is found that the effect of walkers in the same and opposite directions in the view field enhance walkers' intention to move to their preferential direction and separate pedestrian counter flow into lanes of uniform walking direction, especially when the number of walkers is large enough.