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Passengers Follow Strangers, Altering Crowd Dynamics

5/15/2026

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Story summary
  • Researchers found passengers at Eindhoven Centraal follow the person ahead even when it adds travel time.
  • They built an algorithm that identified and excluded proximate groups to isolate individual walkers.
  • Sensors recorded 30 million trajectories on a 1,400 m² area at 10 fps from March 2021 to March 2024.
  • The model reproduced avalanche patterns only when it incorporated the stranger-following effect, leading authors to conclude such interactions shape crowd dynamics.