Applying Machine Learning to Explore Feelings about Sharing the Road with Autonomous Vehicles as a Bicyclist or as a Pedestrian

The current literature on public perceptions of autonomous vehicles focuses on potential users and the target market. However, autonomous vehicles need to operate in a mixed traffic condition, and it is essential to consider the perceptions of road users, especially vulnerable road users. This paper builds explicitly on the limitations of previous studies that did not include a wide range of road users, especially vulnerable road users who often receive less priority. Therefore, this paper considers the perceptions of vulnerable road users towards sharing roads with autonomous vehicles. The data were collected from 795 people. Extreme gradient boosting (XGBoost) and random forests are used to select the most influential independent variables. Then, a decision tree-based model is used to explore the effects of the selected most effective variables on the respondents who approve the use of public streets as a proving ground for autonomous vehicles. The results show that the effect of autonomous vehicles on traffic injuries and fatalities, being safe to share the road with autonomous vehicles, the Elaine Herzberg accident and its outcome, and maximum speed when operating in autonomous are the most influential variables. The results can be used by authorities, companies, policymakers, planners, and other stakeholders.