A Survey of Viva CalleSJ Participants: San Jose, California, 2017

Abstract:

This report presents the findings from a self-complete paper survey of participants at the Viva CalleSJ open streets event held on Sunday, September 17, 2017. The survey was designed to provide information that would help the City of San José assess the success of the event, guide planning for future Viva CalleSJ events, and inform potential funders and community partners about the benefits of Viva CalleSJ. A total of 860 adults at the event completed the one-page paper survey. Survey findings provide detail about how people traveled to the event, their reasons for attending, what they did at the event, how much physical activity they got, and how much money they planned to spend while at the event. The survey also collected data on respondents’ gender, age, and race/ethnicity.

Notable findings include that over three-quarters of respondents expected to be physically active at the event for more than an hour, over one-third expected to spend more than $20, and 22% volunteered that they played Pokémon GO, an augmented-reality game played on smart phones. The game maker enhanced the game along the 2017 Viva CalleSJ route for that day. This Pokémon GO factor likely explains why more people traveled from outside the City of San José to attend Viva CalleSJ in 2017 than did in the preceding two years.

Publications:

A Survey of Viva CalleSJ Participants: San Jose, California, 2017

Research Brief

Authors:

ASHA WEINSTEIN AGRAWAL, PhD

Dr. Agrawal is director of the Mineta Transportation Institute’s National Transportation Finance Center and professor of urban and regional planning at San José (Calif.) State University. Her research and teaching interests in transportation policy and planning include pedestrian and bicycle planning, travel behavior and opinion surveys, and transportation finance. She also works in planning and transportation history. She earned a BA from Harvard University in folklore and mythology, an MSc from the London School of Economics and Political Science in urban and regional planning, and a PhD from the University of California, Berkeley, in city and regional planning.

HILARY NIXON, PhD

Dr. Nixon is professor of urban and regional planning at San José (Calif.) State University. Her research and teaching interests in environmental planning and policy focus on the relationship between environmental attitudes and behavior, particularly with respect to waste management and linkages between transportation and the environment. She holds a BA from the University of Rochester in environmental management and a PhD in planning, policy, and design from the University of California, Irvine.

CAMERON SIMONS

Cameron Simons is a researcher at the Mineta Transportation Institute. His research interests focus on public policy related to transportation and housing and the field of data science. He holds a BS in economics from San José State University.

Published:

April 2018

Keywords:

Pedestrians

Physical fitness

Surveys