Measuring cyclists’ subjective perceptions of the street riding environment using K-means SMOTE-RF model and street view imagery

Abstract

Cyclists' willingness to ride is usually influenced by their subjective perception of the street riding environment. Measuring this perception is crucial for enhancing residents' willingness to ride. We propose an SSB framework (Public Security, Traffic Safety, Scenic Beauty) to quantify cyclists' subjective perception using street view imagery (SVI) and volunteer rating data. To address the issue of imbalanced class distribution in the volunteer rating data and enhance the model's ability to distinguish between positive and negative perception scenes, we employed a combination of the Kmeans Synthetic Minority Over-Sampling Technique (Kmeans-SMOTE) and the Random Forest (RF) classifier. The Kmeans SMOTE-RF model improved Area Under the Curve (AUC) by 0.327 for public safety, 0.2 for traffic safety, and 0.209 for scenic beauty compared to the RF model. Additionally, we incorporated Shapley Additive Explanations (SHAP) to examine how the visual features of SVI impact cyclists' subjective perception. Trees had a positive impact on all dimensions. Fence and sidewalk were key features for enhancing traffic safety perception, while roads positively affected public security and scenic beauty. These insights support urban planners in understanding the relationship between SVI features and cyclists' perceptions, aiding the design of cyclist-friendly street environments.

Keywords

• Subjective perceptions
• Street environment
• Cyclists
• Machine learning
• K-means SMOTE
• Street view imagery