Walking Support System with Users’ Circumstances

Abstract

In Japan, the central government started the promotion of citizens' health by self-supervision in 2000, and walking is recently recognized as the most popular sport for many generations. Based on this background, the present study aimed to design, develop, operate, and evaluate a walking support system, which takes into account the users' circumstances (each user's health conditions, needs, and preferences). The system was developed by integrating Web-GIS (geographic information systems) as a base system and social networking services (SNS) as well as a registration system of walking information into a single system. Additionally, the system was operated for 5 weeks in Chofu City in Tokyo Metropolis, Japan, and the total number of users was 73. Based on the results of the Web questionnaire survey, the usefulness of the system when selecting a walking course was high, and the further use of each function can be expected by the continuous operation of the system. From the results of access analysis of users' log data, it is evident that the system has been used by two types of information terminals approximately in the same way, and that the entire system has been used according to the purpose of the present study, which is to effectively support the users' walking.