Scientific paper ID 2706 : 2025/3

At present, the focus on ensuring pedestrian safety is on prevention in relation to road and rail transport, especially in urban areas. The current regulatory framework has assumed that pedestrian routes such as sidewalks and alleys provide protection from risks leading to injuries, given the status assigned to them by the applicable regulations - including that for planning and designing communication and transport systems in urban areas. However, the current legislation does not correspond to the changed movement trends of a number of social and age groups in large Bulgarian cities. The significantly increasing number of innovative means of transport creates prerequisites for the withdrawal of pedestrian spaces in favor of bicycle traffic, the lack of regulations for the use of two-wheeled electric vehicles at their current power, the lack of volumetric separation, and others. This leads to increased vulnerability to injuries of pedestrians in the regulated areas for this type of traffic. The article presents an analysis and

of the mentioned risk factors and contains an overview of the elements ensuring the necessary prevention. The emphasis is on the search for solutions guaranteed by regulatory instruments such as standards, norms, as well as ethical rules, in order to respond in a multifaceted way to the increased risks for pedestrians. The relevant conclusions are drawn, which prove the need for a broad-spectrum study of the needs of all road users, in order to guarantee their safety.