Pedestrian Level of Service and Sidewalk Encroachment on Urban Commercial Corridors: A Case Study of Jalan K.H. Mas Mansyur, Tanah Abang, Jakarta

Commercial corridors in developing-world megacities often carry high pedestrian volumes without infrastructure built to match them. This study assesses pedestrian Level of Service (LOS) and Walkability Index along Jalan K.H. Mas Mansyur, a high-density commercial corridor linking the Karet Flyover and the Tanah Abang Market Underpass in Central Jakarta, Indonesia. Field surveys measured pedestrian volume, speed, density, and space on weekdays and weekends across the morning, midday, and afternoon peaks, using an effective sidewalk width of 2 m, discounted from the 3 m total geometric width to account for obstruction by street furniture, vendors, and parked vehicles. Simultaneous vehicle volume counts fed a PV² analysis of crossing facility requirements, following Indonesian Ministry of Public Works and Housing Regulation No. 07/P/BM/2023. A survey of 400 pedestrians served two purposes: characterizing corridor users' demographics and travel behavior (predominantly male, with shopping as the leading trip purpose), and providing input to a seven-indicator Walkability Index assessment. The corridor scored LOS A in every period, with pedestrian space ranging from 27 to 54 m² per person and flow rates below 2 pedestrians per minute per meter, even after the effective-width discount for encroachment. The Walkability Index, by contrast, scored the corridor 42 out of 100, reflecting weak performance on obstruction, crossing safety, and security, the dimensions field observation shows are most affected by street vendors and illegal parking pushing pedestrians into the roadway. PV² values exceeded 4.1 × 10⁹ throughout, indicating a need for grade-separated crossings. These results show that a single corridor-averaged LOS score can register "A" even where a validated usability index scores the same corridor poorly: LOS measures flow capacity, not the obstruction, safety, and security conditions that determine whether the sidewalk is actually usable. Pedestrian infrastructure planning in comparable Global South corridors should pair LOS metrics with a broader usability assessment such as the Walkability Index, rather than relying on LOS alone.