Virtual Reality to Study Pedestrian Wayfinding: Motivations and an Experiment on Usability

Despite the significance of pedestrian simulation in the design of the built environment and in the definition of crowd management procedures, we still lack data about several relevant human decision making processes. To tackle this issue, we propose a novel Virtual Reality system which allows to design controlled experiments in virtual settings, by tracking multiple users that wear Head Mounted Displays (HMD). We employed the system to experimentally evaluate the signage of a building of the University of of Milano-Bicocca and its implications on wayfinding decisions. We present here the results of a preliminary test made with the system, aiming at evaluating its usability and feeling of sickness due to the VR itself, as well as preliminary results on human wayfinding decisions.