Pedestrians’ infrastructure design and everyday mobility navigation in urban Wa, Ghana

Despite the effort in safeguarding pedestrians through the provision of pedestrians’ infrastructure, studies have shown that motorists and pedestrians crash are yet occassioned by non-utilization of existing pedestrians’ infrastructure in cities of the global South. However, studies barely explored pedestrians’ perception concerning pedestrians infrastructure especially how the socio-demongraphic characteristics of pedestrians shape their everyday mobility navigation within existing pedestrians infrastructure across cities. This study draws on the rational instrumentalism, rational choice theory alongside binary regression modelling, to anayse the perceptions of pedestrians about how they navigate daily mobility within pedestrians infrastructures. Therefore, the study, (1) explore pedestrians’ knowledge and awareness of the existing pedestrians infrastructure; (2) assess pedestrians’ perceived safety and convenience of existing pedestrians infrastructure, (3) analyse whether the proximity of pedestrians infrastructure matters in pedestrians' everyday mobility decisions. Our findings revealed that proximity of pedestrians’ infrastructure to pedestrians’ trips destinations was found as the major factor (OR = 35.010, 95% CI 5.657 to 216.68) shaping pedestrians’ decision to utilize existing pedestrians’ infrastructure in their everyday mobility navigation. The findings suggest that utilization depends more on the proximity of pedestrians’ infrastructure to pedestrians’ destination trips. We argue that while pedestrians’ infrastructure provision is imperative for facilitating mobility and safety, efforts such as pedestrians’ engagement and awareness creation about the utility of pedestrians infrastructure may improve their utility.