Safety, comfort, and design of multi-use pathways: a scoping review

Active modes of transportation support positive health, environmental, and equity outcomes by promoting physical activity and reducing reliance on motor vehicles. Multi-use pathways are a type of active transportation infrastructure that supports a variety of modes and trip purposes. Because they accommodate diverse users, multi-use pathways have unique design considerations. Understanding the safety, comfort, and design of multi-use pathways can help practitioners understand when these facilities are appropriate and how to design them for the comfort and safety of all users. This paper presents a scoping review of the literature related to the safety, comfort, and design of multi-use pathways, with the aim of improving the understanding of the current research landscape and identifying gaps in the literature. Systematic search and screening methods were used to find 59 relevant papers. Common topics among the included papers were objective safety, user speeds, conflict/interaction, level of service analysis, and the exploration of user preferences. Identified research gaps included the need for more studies on emerging modes such as e-bikes and micromobility, a deeper understanding of user preferences and behaviour, more comparisons between different regions, and the use of findings to develop prescriptive design models for practitioners. The findings of this scoping review can guide future research in the area of multi-use pathways and help researchers produce useful findings to inform practitioners.