A deeper understanding of pedestrian dynamics is essential to improve crowd
flows in public spaces such as train stations. It is essential to understand
both the physical and the psychological processes present in this context.
However, current research on train boarding behavior is limited in scope and
mainly focuses on how group level variables such as number of
boarders/deboarders influence train boarding efficiency. Viewing pedestrian
dynamics through a psychological lens is important for a detailed understanding
of the train boarding context and to recognize target areas for improving crowd
flows. At Dutch train stations, boarders follow a social norm of waiting at the
train door until deboarding is complete. Although people generally adhere to
this norm, the way it is executed may not be optimal for deboarding efficiency.
We investigate how waiting boarders form a deboarding channel (a corridor where
deboarders exit the train) which is a macroscopic structure formed by
pedestrians, and how this channel in turn influences the efficiency of
deboarding. Analyzing a dataset with 3278 boarding events at Utrecht Centraal
Station in the Netherlands from 2017 - 2020 (a subset of a trajectory dataset
that captures 100,000 trajectories per day), we found that higher numbers of
boarders and a higher ratio of boarders to deboarders, reduced the width of the
deboarding channel, and a lower width was associated with lower deboarding
efficiency. These results shift the focus from group level variables to
identifying macroscopic structures that are formed when pedestrians interact
within a social system and provide specific target areas where
nudges/behavioral interventions could be implemented