Investigating the Influence of Dockless Electric Bike-share on Travel Behavior, Attitudes, Health, and Equity

Cities throughout the world have implemented bike-share systems as a strategy for expanding mobility options. While these have attracted substantial ridership, little is known about their influence on travel behavior more broadly. The aim of this study was to examine how shared electric bikes (e-bikes) and e-scooters influence individual travel attitudes and behavior, and related outcomes of physical activity and transportation equity. The study involved a survey in the greater Sacramento area of 1959 households before (Spring 2016) and 988 after (Spring 2019) the Summer 2018 implementation of the e-bike and e-scooterservice operated by Jump, Inc., as well as a direct survey of 703 e-bike users (in Fall 2018 & Spring 2019). Among householdrespondents, 3–13% reported having used the service. Of e-bike share trips, 35% substituted for car travel, 30% substituted for walking, and 5% were used to connect to transit. Before- and after-household surveys indicated a slight decrease in self-reported (not objectively measured) median vehicle miles traveled and slight positive shifts in attitudes towards bicycling. Service implementation was associated with minimal changes in health in terms of physical activity and numbers of collisions. The percentages of users by self-reported student status, race, and income suggest a fairly equitable service distribution by these parameters, but each survey under-represents racial minorities and people with low incomes. Therefore, the study is inconclusive about how this service impacts those most in need. Furthermore, aggregated socio-demographics of areas where trips started or ended did not correlate with, and therefore are not reliable indicators of, the socio-demographics of e-bike-share users. Thus, targeted surveying of racial minorities and people with low-incomes is needed to understand bike-share equity

Research Synthesis for the California Zero Traffic Fatalities Task Force

This research synthesis consists of a set of white papers that jointly provide a review of research on the current practicefor setting speed limits and future opportunities to improve roadway safety. This synthesis was developed to inform thework of the Zero Traffic Fatalities Task Force, which was formed in 2019 by the California State Transportation Agencyin response to California Assembly Bill 2363 (Friedman). The statutory goal of the Task Force is to develop a structured,coordinated process for early engagement of all parties to develop policies to reduce traffic fatalities to zero. Thisreport addresses the following critical issues related to the work of the Task Force: (i) the relationship between trafficspeed and safety; (ii) lack of empirical justification for continuing to use the 85th percentile rule; (iii) why we need toreconsider current speed limit setting practices; (iv) promising alternatives to current methods of setting speed limits;and (v) improving road designs to increase road user safety

Investigating the Influence of Dockless Electric Bike-share on Travel Behavior, Attitudes, Health, and Equity

Cities throughout the world have implemented bike-share systems as a strategy for expanding mobility options. While these have attracted substantial ridership, little is known about their influence on travel behavior more broadly. The aim of this study was to examine how shared electric bikes (e-bikes) and e-scooters influence individual travel attitudes and behavior, and related outcomes of physical activity and transportation equity. The study involved a survey in the greater Sacramento area of 1959 households before (Spring 2016) and 988 after (Spring 2019) the Summer 2018 implementation of the e-bike and e-scooterservice operated by Jump, Inc., as well as a direct survey of 703 e-bike users (in Fall 2018 & Spring 2019). Among householdrespondents, 3–13% reported having used the service. Of e-bike share trips, 35% substituted for car travel, 30% substituted for walking, and 5% were used to connect to transit. Before- and after-household surveys indicated a slight decrease in self-reported (not objectively measured) median vehicle miles traveled and slight positive shifts in attitudes towards bicycling. Service implementation was associated with minimal changes in health in terms of physical activity and numbers of collisions. The percentages of users by self-reported student status, race, and income suggest a fairly equitable service distribution by these parameters, but each survey under-represents racial minorities and people with low incomes. Therefore, the study is inconclusive about how this service impacts those most in need. Furthermore, aggregated socio-demographics of areas where trips started or ended did not correlate with, and therefore are not reliable indicators of, the socio-demographics of e-bike-share users. Thus, targeted surveying of racial minorities and people with low-incomes is needed to understand bike-share equity

How Dock-less Electric Bike Share Influences Travel Behavior, Attitudes, Health, and Equity: Phase II

Dock-less, electric bike-share services offer cities a new transportation option with the potential to improve environmental, social, and health outcomes. But these benefits accrue only if bike-share use replaces car travel. The purpose of this study is to examine factors influencing whether bike-share substitutes for driving and the degree to which and under what circumstances bike-share use reduces car travel. Major findings in this report include (1) bike-share in the Sacramento region most commonly substitutes for car and walking trips, (2) each bike in the Sacramento bike-share fleet reduces users’ VMT by an average of approximately 2.8 miles per day, (3) areas with a higher proportion of low-income households tend to use bike-share less, (4) bike-share availability appears to induce new trips to restaurants and shopping and for recreation, (5) bike-share trips from commercial and office areas were more likely to replace walking or transit trips, while bike-share trips from non-commercial areas (and trips to home or restaurants) were more likely to replace car trips, (6) expanding the bike-share service boundary at the same fleet density decreases system efficiency and VMT reductions per bike. Our result suggests the need for an efficient rebalancing strategy specific to areas by time of day to increase the service efficiency and its benefits. Further analysis of the data used in this study to examine questions such as how bike share can improve transit connections and factors inducing bike use at the individual level will contribute to the development of more robust models and provide additional insights for bike share operation strategies and policy implementation

Bicycles and Micromobility for Disaster Response and Recovery

Bicycles and other forms of micromobility have been anecdotally used in past disasters to help save lives and improve community recovery. However, research and practice are scarce on this resilient transportation strategy, which limits its usefulness and possible benefits. To fill this gap, our paper investigates the potential role bicycles and micromobility in facilitating (or limiting) disaster response and recovery. Given the lack of exploration on the topic, we convened an online workshop where we conducted brainstorming and focus group discussions with disaster experts from various government agencies, not-for-profit organizations, academia, and policy groups. We present a synthesis of that discussion, along with a review of the existing literature. We conclude there is strong potential for bicycles and micromobility for different disaster phases, hazard types, and groups of people. However, multiple barriers exist related to implementation and safety, suggesting a need for future research and policy in the transportation and emergency management fields and practices

Micromobility Trip Characteristics, Transit Connections, and COVID-19 Effects

While micromobility services (e.g., bikeshare, e-bike share, e-scooter share) hold great potential for providing clean travel, estimating the effects of those services on vehicle miles traveled and reducing greenhouse gases is challenging. To address some of the challenges, this study examined survey, micromobility, and transit data collected from 2017 to 2021 in approximately 20 U.S. cities. Micromobility fleet utilization ranged widely from 0.7 to 12 trips per vehicle per day, and the average trip distance was 0.8 to 3.6 miles. The median (range) rates at which micromobility trips substituted for other modes were 41% (16–71%) for car trips, 36% (5–48%) for walking, and 8% (2–35%) for transit, 5% (2–42%) for no trip. In most cities, the mean actual trip distance was approximately 1.5 to 2 times longer than the mean distance of a line connecting origin to destination. There was a weak and unclear connection between micromobility use and transit use that requires further study to more clearly delineate, but micromobility use had a stronger positive relationship to nearby rail use than to nearby bus use in cities with rail and bus service. The COVID-19 pandemic led to more moderate declines in docked than in dockless bike-share systems. Metrics that would enable better assessment of the impacts of micromobility are vehicle miles traveled and emissions of micromobility fleets and their service vehicles, and miles and percentage of micromobility trips that connect to transit or substitute for car trips