Assist. Professor at the University of Maribor, Chiara Gruden’s lecture, 22 September 2026, 15.00

Assist. Professor at the University of Maribor, Chiara Gruden gave a lecture titled “Pedestrian behavior and urban safety” on Tuesday, September 22th 2026 at the Amphitheater of Railways and Transport of the Department of Transportation Planning and Engineering of NTUA.

Pedestrian behavior and safety are central challenges in the development of safe and walkable urban environments. Unlike other road users, pedestrians are vulnerable, difficult to detect and track, and their intentions and movements are often unpredictable, making their interaction with traffic particularly complex. The presentation examines pedestrian behavior through various approaches, like field observations, video analysis and eye-tracking experiments in order to assess potentially dangerous situations. Particular attention is given to pedestrian behavior and visual attention during road crossing at signalized and unsignalized intersections and under different distracting conditions. The research further explores pedestrian microsimulation and its calibration using real-world observations, demonstrating the importance of accurately representing pedestrian behavior when assessing safety. Overall, the work highlights the need to combine behavioral observation, objective safety assessment, and calibrated simulation models to better understand pedestrian-traffic interactions and support safer urban environments.

Speaker Bio:

Chiara Gruden is Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Civil Engineering, Transportation Engineering and Architecture at the University of Maribor (Slovenia). She has experience in the field of road safety and vulnerable road users, specifically pedestrians. In 2022 she completed her Ph.D., titled «Development of a methodology to calibrate a pedestrian microsimulation model», which was focused on the real and simulated behavior of pedestrians. She gained her competencies from several international realities: after completing her studies at the University of Trieste (Italy), she enrolled for her Ph.D. in Maribor (Slovenia), during which she was guest researcher at the Transportation Research Institute IMOB in Hasselt (Belgium), at the University KORE in Enna (Italy), at the University of Osijek (Croatia) and the Technical University of Munich (Germany). Currently she is member of the Chair of Traffic Engineering and Safety at the Faculty of Civil Eng., Transportation Eng. and Architecture in Maribor. Together with the other members of the Chair, she is actively involved in research, being (co-)author of many scientific publications, and in several national projects for the Slovenian Ministry and for the Slovenian Motorway Company, as well as in international, H2020, Erasmus and bilateral projects.