Exploring Influential Factors of Free-Floating Bike-Sharing Usage Frequency before and after COVID-19

In order to better understand the impact of COVID-19 on the free-floating bike-sharing (FFBS) system and the potential role of FFBS played in the pandemic period, this study explores the impact mechanism of travel frequency of FFBS users before and after the pandemic. Using the online questionnaire collected in Nanjing, China, we first analyze the changes of travel frequency, travel distance, and travel duration in these two periods. Then, two ordered logit models are applied to explore the contributing factors of the weekly trip frequency of FFBS users before and after COVID-19. The results show that: (1) While the overall travel duration and travel distance of FFBS users decreased after the pandemic, the trip frequency of FFBS users increased as the travel duration increased. (2) Since COVID-19, attitude perception variables of the comfort level and the low travel price have had significantly positive impacts on the weekly trip frequency of FFBS users. (3) Respondents who use FFBS as a substitution for public transport are more likely to travel frequently in a week after the outbreak of COVID-19. (4) The travel time in off-peak hours of working days, weekends, and holidays has a significantly positive correlation with the trip frequency of FFBS users. Finally, several relevant policy recommendations and management strategies are proposed for the operation and development of FFBS during the similar disruptive public health crisis.

COVID-19 and cycling: a review of the literature on changes in cycling levels and government policies from 2019 to 2022

This paper reviews 100 peer-reviewed articles and 12 non-refereed papers on COVID-19 and cycling published from March 2020 to January 2023. Overall, the studies suggest more increases than decreases in cycling, with some cities reporting large increases. However, there has been much variation among countries, cities, and specific corridors within cities as well as variation by gender, age, ethnicity, income group, trip purpose, and time period of the pandemic. The largest increases in cycling in 2020 were for recreation, exercise, and stress relief on weekends and weekday afternoons. By comparison, cycling to work, university, schools, and shopping generally declined. Most studies reported expansions or improvements in bikeway networks, often specifically related to COVID or accelerated due to COVID, and with a particular emphasis on low-stress facilities such as protected bike lanes, slow streets, car-free streets, and traffic calmed neighbourhood streets. Most of the studies examining the social equity impacts of COVID-related cycling policies found them to be broadly equitable across income, ethnic, age, and gender dimensions. Many studies recommended further expansion of low-stress, safer facilities in order to attract a broader cross-section of the population to cycling. [ FROM AUTHOR] Copyright of Transport Reviews is the property of Routledge and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full . (Copyright applies to all s.)

Effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on the popularity of protected areas for mountain biking and hiking in Australia: insights from volunteered geographic information. (Special Issue: Covid-19 and outdoor recreation.)

Although the popularity of protected areas for recreation has been increasing, short term changes in visitation occurred during the COVID-19 pandemic. To examine how volunteer geographic information data can be used to monitor such often rapid changes in visitation across multiple locations, data from online fitness platforms for mountain biking (Trailforks) and remote area hiking (Wikiloc) were analysed before (2019) and during (2020-2021) the COVID-19 pandemic for 40 protected areas in Queensland, Australia. Mountain biking was popular with a total of 93,311 routes on Trailforks, with 26,936 routes in 2019, increasing to 37,406 in 2020, and then decreasing to 28,969 in 2021. Approximately 66% of all the routes were from just three urban protected areas out of the 12 with route data. There were 4367 routes for remote area hiking on Wikiloc across 36 protected areas, which increased slightly from 1081 in 2019, to 1421 in 2020 and to 1865 in 2021. Across 18 factors, distance from urban areas and networks of mountain biking trails best predicted popularity for mountain biking based on Generalised Linear Models. In contrast, average slope and large networks of hiking trails best predicted hiking, with similar results for each year. The two sources of online data were correlated with trail counter data, although not consistently. The results highlight how external factors affect visitation, but also how the same types of protected areas remained popular, and that the impacts of COVID-19 pandemic on visitation in South-East Queensland protected areas was less dramatic than for other regions. This study further highlights how volunteered geographic information can be used to assess the popularity of protected areas, including in rapidly changing conditions. Management implications Rapid changes in visitation can be challenging to monitor and manage, as occurred with the COVID-19 pandemic. The impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on mountain biking and hiking and factors predicting protected area popularity were examined across different parks. Visitation increased at different stages of the pandemic, with mountain bikers' preferring urban parks with networks of mountain bike trails while some hikers preferred more remote large parks. Managers can expand on traditional methods of visitor monitoring by using volunteered geographic information to monitor rapid and longer-term trends of visitation to protected areas.

Cyclists or avatars: is virtual cycling filling a short-term void during COVID-19 lockdown?

Indoor cycling has been a trend during the COVID-19 pandemic due to the lockdowns and social distancing measures imposed by most countries. Virtual cycling (eCycling) has grown exponentially, and its popularity among amateur and professional cyclists is shown by the fact that they regularly participate in virtual competitions in which people from all over the world interact via streaming. Although eCycling is derived from a traditional sport and adapted to a virtual platform, its future success once real competitions are reinstated has been seriously questioned. This virtual cycling modality has been openly criticized for the potential differences when competing and that it does not represent the true essence of cycling. These questions and the lack of clear guidelines for its competition suggest that eCycling has to go a long way before being considered a sport. This manuscript aims to present some challenges and opportunities regarding how virtual racing could be sustainable over time once the COVID-19 lockdown is over and demonstrate that eCycling was not just filling a short-term void left by real cycling during this pandemic.

Spatio-temporal dynamics of aerosol distribution in an urban environment recorded in situ by means of a bike based monitoring system

Aerosol pollution in urban areas is highly variable due to numerous single emission sources such as automobiles, industrial and commercial activities as well as domestic heating, but also due to complex building structures redirecting air mass flows, producing leeward and windward turbulences and resuspension effects. In this publication, it is shown that one or even few aerosol monitoring sites are not able to reflect these complex patterns. In summer 2019, aerosol pollution was recorded in high spatial resolution during six night and daytime tours with a mobile sensor platform on a trailer pulled by a bicycle. Particle mass loadings showed a high variability with PM10 values ranging from 1.3 to 221 µg m-3 and PM2.5 values from 0.7 to 69.0 µg m-3. Geostatistics were used to calculate respective models of the spatial distributions of PM2.5 and PM10. The resulting maps depict the variability of aerosol concentrations within the urban space. These spatial distribution models delineate the distributions without cutting out the built-up structures. Elsewise, the overall spatial patterns do not become visible because of being sharply interrupted by those outcuts in the resulting maps. Thus, the spatial maps allow to identify most affected urban areas and are not restricted to the street space. Furthermore, this method provides an insight to potentially affected areas, and thus can be used to develop counter measures. It is evident that the spatial aerosol patterns cannot be directly derived from the main wind direction, but result far more from an interplay between main wind direction, built-up patterns and distribution of pollution sources. Not all pollution sources are directly obvious and more research has to be carried out to explain the micro-scale variations of spatial aerosol distribution patterns. In addition, since aerosol load in the atmosphere is a severe issue for health and well-being of city residents more attention has to be paid to these local inhomogeneities.

Short-Term Forecasting of Dockless Bike-Sharing Demand with the Built Environment and Weather

To help related operators to allocate and dispatch the number of bike-sharing and provide good guidance for setting up electronic fences, this paper proposes a spatiotemporal graph convolution network prediction model (SGCNPM) with multiple factors to enhance the accuracy of predicting the demand for bike-sharing. First, we consider time, built environment, and weather. We use a multigraph convolution network (GCN) to model the built environment, utilize a long short-term memory (LSTM) network to extract temporal features, and utilize a fully connected network (FCN) to model weather influence. We construct SGCNPM which can effectively fuse GCN, LSTM, and FCN, thus creating a prediction method considering the influence of multiple factors. The results of the real case in Tianjin, China, show that the proposed model can perform well in improving prediction accuracy. Also, we analyze the influence of factors on model prediction results in different periods.

Evaluation of the functionality, safety, and environmental impact of the new pop-up bicycle lane on Konstantinos Karamanlis Avenue in Thessaloniki, Greece

The COVID-19 pandemic had some positive results regarding the established policy of the European Union (EU) of promoting active mobility, such as the creation of temporary bicycle lanes and paths, to facilitate mobility in the era of social distancing. Such a bicycle lane was constructed in the city of Thessaloniki, Greece, on Konstantinos Karamanlis Avenue. In the summer of 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, a bicycle lane was constructed on Konstantinos Karamanlis Avenue. In the present paper, a questionnaire survey is presented regarding the functionality, effectiveness, safety, and environmental impact of this specific bicycle lane. In total, 228 people participated in the survey. They were able to evaluate the different problems encountered on the bicycle lane and the behavior of the other road users and to make judgments and suggestions for its improvement. Important conclusions emerge from the collected data, such as that the citizens believe that there are significant problems with the safety of the bicycle lane and less important problems with its operation. Finally, it seems that there is a great desire to strengthen active mobility and especially cycling in the city of Thessaloniki, given that the infrastructure will provide the appropriate safety.

Using computer vision for the automated detection of cyclists’ safety-related behaviour

ContextThe COVID-19 pandemic has increased bicycle use in cities worldwide as citizens shift from public transport towards individual transportation modes. At the same time, cycling infrastructure is slow to adapt to this increase in traffic. For crowded infrastructure, the safe behaviour of cyclists increases in importance. But while automated solutions for detecting rule infractions of motorised vehicles exist (e.g. speeding-cameras for cars), no such systems for detecting dangerous behaviours for cyclists are available, preventing road safety actors from conducting focused education campaigns.MethodsWe collected roadside video data containing 645 cyclists on multiple cycling lanes in Copenhagen, Denmark. Human observers pre-screened the video data and identified instances of unsafe behaviour, i.e. cyclists not using a helmet, using a phone, or using headphones. We trained a state-of-the-art computer vision algorithm to detect these unsafe behaviours in cyclists. The algorithm was then applied to test data, which contained 126 cyclists in total.ResultsOverall, the algorithm detected 89.5% of the bicycles present in the test video data, i.e. 15 out of 126 cyclists were not detected. Unsafe behaviour of cyclists was correctly identified in 77% of instances (missing 18 occurrences). Generally, non-helmet-use detection worked best, while performance for headphone-use detection was the lowest.Conclusion and Learning OutcomesThere is a lack of safety-related behavioural data for bicyclists. The automated detection of safety-related behaviour through computer vision algorithms presents an efficient way to collect comprehensive, diverse and temporal data, which policymakers can use to plan police enforcement and traffic education campaigns.

Safety of cycling infrastructure installed during COVID-19 pandemic in Toronto Canada

BackgroundIn the spring/summer of 2020, 8 new cycling infrastructure corridors (6 downtown) were installed in Toronto, Canada during the COVID-19 pandemic. Changes in cycling volumes and safety (6 cycle tracks and 2 buffered bicycle lanes), pre-versus post-installation were examined.MethodsCycling volumes were estimated using 34 temporary counters across the city (September 2019 compared to 2020/2021) and 21 downtown permanent bike counters (May 2020 compared to 2021;October 2019 compared with September 2020). Pre- and post- installation cycling volume data on new infrastructure was based on two-day average counts collected in 2020. Police-reported cyclist collisions pre- (2016-Aug 10, 2020, n= 278 collisions) and post-installation (Aug 11, 2020- Dec 31, 2021, n=102 collisions) were mapped within 25-metres of each cycling corridor. Collisions were adjusted by observation time.ResultsCycling volumes increased by 12% across the city [58 to 65 bikes/hour];72% downtown (128 to 220 bikes/hour), and 68% on the new infrastructure (106 to 179 bikes/hour). Cycling collision rates decreased 28% on the infrastructure (0.74/1000 to 0.53/1000 cycle months, respectively), with most collisions occurring at intersections with little change post-installation (72% versus 74%, respectively).ConclusionCycling volumes increased post installation, most markedly downtown and on the cycling infrastructure. There was a reduction in collisions with the installation of cycling infrastructure;however, the proportion of intersection collisions increased.Learning OutcomesThere was a trend towards increased cycling in Toronto since the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic. Although collisions declined along new cycling infrastructure, intersections must be designed to improve cycling safety.

Exploring the Spatially Heterogeneous Effects of the Built Environment on Bike-Sharing Usage during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Bike-sharing holds promise for available and healthy mobility services during COVID-19 where bike sharing users can make trips with lower health concerns due to social distancing compared to the restricted transportation modes such as public transit and ridesharing services. Leveraging the trip data of the Divvy bike-sharing system in Chicago, this study exploresspatially heterogeneous effects of built environment on bike-sharing usage under the pandemic. Results show that the average weekly ridership declined by 52.04%. To account for the spatially heterogeneous relationship between the built environment and the ridership, the geographically weighted regression (GWR) model and the semiparametric GWR (S-GWR) model are constructed. We find that the S-GWR model outperforms the GWR and the multiple linear regression models. The results of the S-GWR model indicate that education employment density, distance to subway, COVID-19 cases, and ridership before COVID-19 are global variables. The effects between ridership and the built environment factros (i.e., household density, office employment density, and the ridership) vary across space. The results of this study could provide a useful reference to transportation planners and bike-sharing operators to determine the high bike-sharing demand area under the pandemic,thus adjusting station locations, capacity, and rebalancing schemes accordingly.

Dimensioning of Cycle Lanes Based on the Assessment of Comfort for Cyclists

In a century where mobility is becoming more sustainable in terms of energy transition, emissions reduction, and a healthy quality of life, the use of bicycles is increasing and has many advantages over other modes of transport that have been underused. The bicycle is an excellent alternative for short distances of up to five kilometers. In combination with public transportation, it can also successfully compete with motorized transport for longer distances. For the adequate development of cycling, it is necessary to create the right conditions in terms of accessibility and road safety. This means planning appropriate cycling infrastructure where cyclists feel comfortable and safe, which can lead to additional increased use in bicycles for everyday trips. Comfort for cyclists is a concept supported by road safety, a pleasant environment, connectivity, and the attractiveness of cycling infrastructure. In other words, cyclists respond to the physical, psychological, and sociological aspects of the cycling experience that are also related to the cycling infrastructure and environment: where I am, what I see and perceive, and how I feel. This paper presents the concept of the level of service for cyclists (BLOS) as a unified method for defining the comfort of cyclists. This paper presents the method for determining the level of service or comfort for bicyclists as a function of road width, width of the cycling area, traffic volume, and the speed and structure of motorized traffic flow. The result of BLOS, the mathematical model used, is graphically presented and allows decision-makers and designers of cycling infrastructure to easily assess the suitability of cycling infrastructure. Different diagrams for different input data are presented in the paper.

The Perspective Projects Promoting Sustainable Mobility by Active Travel to School on the Example of the Southern Poland Region

The paper presents a discussion concerning the development of projects regarding active travel with the policy of sustainable mobility, with active school transport in southern Poland being taken into special consideration. The implementation of the idea of sustainable school travel planning involves linking several social groups, including traffic planners and organizers, school administrators, governments, parents, and children. This, in turn, requires considering the criteria reported by all parties when choosing a scenario for the region’s development in terms of transport solutions. The following study was based on the methodological foundations of multicriteria decision-making analysis. The research purpose of this paper is to identify and classify the actions, policies, and scenarios of active travel projects for the sustainable development of mobility based on the cities of southern Poland. The evaluation was carried out through expert methods with multicriteria decision-making tools based on the MULTIPOL (MULTI-criteria and POLicy) prospective analysis technique. It allowed for the selection of the most probable policy, which covered the six actions considered by the experts to be the most significant for the development of the active school transport system in the analyzed region. Such actions are as follows: identification of walking school bus routes, modernization of crosswalk lines, planning of walking and cycling routes to schools, promoting safety educational programs, distribution of active school transport booklets and cycling, and pedestrian skills training workshops. The paper presents a new method to evaluate the policies and actions regarding promoting sustainable (active) travel to school. The innovative approach results from assembling a mixed group of people (stakeholders) as experts. The mix of experts consisting of users (pupils and parents), practitioners, and scientist experts in this field allowed us to score policies, actions, and scenarios, enabling a wider spectrum of assessment than before.

Cycling Tourism: A Literature Review to Assess Implications, Multiple Impacts, Vulnerabilities, and Future Perspectives

Cycle tourists are increasingly prominent in the profile of world tourism and, in the light of the literature, it is essential, among other things, to examine more closely who they are, what their concerns and motivations are that generate the choice of a cycle tourism product, and, as a priority, the level of economic, social, and environmental impact they cause at destination. In this context, this literature review aims at identifying authors’ and publishers’ interest in cycle tourism, the positive and negative effects of this form of tourism on the economic environment (direct and indirect), as well as effects on the social environment (benefits and potential drawbacks for local communities, along with health benefits for practitioners) and, last but not least, the degree of vulnerability to economic crises generated by travel restrictions. The conclusions reported in this article, as they have been drawn from analyses and examples of best practice, based on natural and anthropogenic geographical conditions, will be prioritised as future research directions. The usefulness of this approach lies in the information with significant applied and novelty aspects, addressed to local, regional, and national authorities, cycling and cycle-tourism associations, and various private interested enterprises, with a view to promoting cycling for recreational purposes and implementing cycling/cycle-tourism infrastructure as a sustainable way of developing small towns and rural areas with tourism potential.

Influencia del optimismo en el impacto por confinamiento por COVID-19 en España: análisis en función de su nivel de competición (Influence of the optimism on the impact of COVID-19 lockdown in Spain: analysis according to competition level)

Competition cycling is a sport that is mainly trained outdoors. The home confinement that imposed the quarantine for COVID-19 in Spain from March to June 2020 meant the cancellation of all competitions and prevented training on the roads. Secluded at home, the cyclists had to train with what they had and face a situation of isolation that prevented them from maintaining training routines as well as access to the usual means and infrastructures. The passing of the days produced a multitude of symptoms and responses in the athletes. Knowing the most adaptive and detecting the least adaptive highlights the importance of the trait of optimism during the confinement and the impact that this situation had on cyclists in the under23, elite and master categories. The LOT-R questionnaire was used in the evaluation. The results show that cyclists categorized with low optimism in the u23 category were the most affected by confinement, presenting a greater number of negative thoughts about their sporting future, worse mood, greater negative affect and difficulties in maintaining daily routines, reconciling the dream and orient to the achievement of the objectives. In contrast, elite cyclists with high optimism experienced a greater perception of energy and a greater positive affect. These results highlight the importance of mediating variables such as optimism as well as the importance of evaluating the impact of events such as confinement in a differential way to detect the most vulnerable profiles. Alternate : El ciclismo de competición es un deporte que se entrena principalmente al aire libre. El confinamiento en casa que impuso la cuarentena para el COVID-19 en España de marzo a junio de 2020 supuso la cancelación de todas las competiciones e impidió entrenar en las carreteras. Recluidos en casa, los ciclistas tuvieron que entrenar con lo que tenían y enfrentarse a una situación de aislamiento que les impedía mantener las rutinas de entrenamiento, así como el acceso a los medios e infraestructuras habituales. El paso de los días produjo multitud de síntomas y respuestas en los deportistas. Conocer a los más adaptativos y detectar a los menos adaptativos pone de manifiesto la importancia del rasgo de optimismo durante el encierro y el impacto que esta situación tuvo en los ciclistas de las categorías sub23, élite y máster. En la evaluación se utilizó el cuestionario LOT-R. Los resultados muestran que los ciclistas categorizados con bajo optimismo en la categoría sub23 fueron los más afectados por el encierro, presentando un mayor número de pensamientos negativos sobre su futuro deportivo, peor estado de ánimo, mayor afecto negativo y dificultades para mantener las rutinas diarias, conciliar el sueño y orientarse a la consecución de los objetivos. Por el contrario, los ciclistas de élite con alto optimismo experimentaron una mayor percepción de energía y un mayor afecto positivo. Estos resultados ponen de manifiesto la importancia de variables mediadoras como el optimismo, así como la importancia de evaluar el impacto de eventos como el confinamiento de forma diferencial para detectar los perfiles más vulnerables.Alternate :O ciclismo de competição é um esporte que é treinado principalmente ao ar livre. O confinamento domiciliar que impôs a quarentena do COVID-19 na Espanha de março a junho de 2020 significou o cancelamento de todas as competições e impediu os treinos nas estradas. Isolados em casa, os ciclistas tiveram que treinar com o que tinham e enfrentar uma situação de isolamento que os impedia de manter as rotinas de treino, bem como o acesso aos meios e infraestruturas habituais. O passar dos dias produziu uma infinidade de sintomas e respostas nos atletas. Conhecer os mais adaptativos e detectar os menos adaptativos destaca a importância do traço de otimismo durante o confinamento e o impacto que esta situação teve nos ciclistas das categorias sub23, elite e master. O questionário LOT-R foi utilizado na avaliação. Os resultados mostram que os ciclistas ca egorizados com baixo otimismo na categoria u23 foram os mais afetados pelo confinamento, apresentando maior número de pensamentos negativos sobre seu futuro esportivo, pior humor, maior afeto negativo e dificuldades em manter rotinas diárias, conciliar o sonho e orientar para o alcance dos objetivos. Em contraste, ciclistas de elite com alto otimismo experimentaram uma maior percepção de energia e um maior afeto positivo. Esses resultados destacam a importância de mediar variáveis ​​como o otimismo, bem como a importância de avaliar o impacto de eventos como o confinamento de forma diferenciada para detectar os perfis mais vulneráveis.

Riding through the pandemic: Using Strava data to monitor the impacts of COVID-19 on spatial patterns of bicycling.

COVID-19 prompted a bike boom and cities around the world responded to increased demand for space to ride with street reallocations. Evaluating these interventions has been limited by a lack of spatially-temporally continuous ridership data. Our paper aims to address this gap using crowdsourced data on bicycle ridership. We evaluate changes in spatial patterns of bicycling during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic (Apr - Oct 2020) in Vancouver, Canada using Strava data and a local indicator of spatial autocorrelation. We map statistically significant change in ridership and reference clusters of change to a high-resolution base map. Amongst streets where bicycling increased, we measured the proportion of increase occurring on pre-existing bicycle facilities or street reallocations compared to streets without. In all our analyses, we evaluate patterns across subsets of Strava data representing recreation, commuting, and ridership generated by women and older adults (55 + ). We found consistent and unique patterns by trip purpose and demographics: samples generated by women and older adults showed increases near green and blue spaces and on street reallocations that increased access to parks, and these patterns were also mirrored in the recreation sample. Commute ridership highlighted distinct patterns of increase around the hospital district. Across all subsets most increases occurred on bicycle facilities (pre-existing or provisional), with a strong preference for high-comfort facilities. We demonstrate that changes in spatial patterns of bicycle ridership can be monitored using Strava data, and that nuanced patterns can be identified using trip and demographic labels in the data.

Stemming the Tide: Approaching Urban Freight in the Era of e-Commerce

The relationship between cities and freight is undergoing an unprecedented and tumultuous transition. While e-commerce has long been chipping away at traditional flows of goods, the COVID-19 pandemic caused a massive acceleration of trends, with some experts estimating that 10 years' worth of e-commerce adoption took place in the space of 3 months. This shift has had a profound effect on goods movement, and consequently, the transportation systems on which it depends. The number of small parcels delivered in the US rose to 20.2 billion in 2020. Crucially, a large portion of these parcels end up at individual residences rather than consolidated at retail locations. At the same time, customers expect goods to arrive faster than ever, often in 2 days or less. This rapid increase in volume, disaggregation, and speed requires a constant flow of delivery vehicles that manifests as urban truck traffic. More freight vehicles require more places to load and unload, and these activities often take place at the curb. Cities typically require off-street loading zones for some types of new construction, but these requirements vary widely and most freight is accounted for by extant buildings or areas where there is not space for off-street loading.

Cycling Infrastructure for All EPACs Included?

A modal shift to electric pedal-assisted cycles (EPACs) can help with reaching the transport emission goals of the European Green Deal. With the rising sales of EPACs in Europe, a lack of appropriate (electric) cycling infrastructure remains a major barrier for many potential users. This paper discusses the results of a survey about the requirements of (potential) cyclists to design a better cycling infrastructure. The differences in requirements for non-cyclists vs. cyclists and electric cyclists vs. conventional cyclists are discussed using statistical analysis. The key findings are that cyclists and non-cyclists both require wide quality cycling infrastructure with safe crossing points, secure bicycle parking and smart traffic lights. Non-cyclists’ requirements significantly differ from cyclists’ on 12 items, of which rain cover while cycling and parking spots for the car are the most noteworthy. There is (but) one significant difference between the requirements of EPAC users and conventional cyclists: the need for charging points for EPACs along the cycle route.

Implications of the Relocation Type and Frequency for Shared Autonomous Bike Service: Comparison between the Inner and Complete City Scenarios for Magdeburg as a Case Study

Finding a sustainable mobility solution for the future is one of the most competitive challenges in the logistics and transportation sector nowadays. Researchers, universities, and companies are working intensively to provide novel mobility options that can be environmentally friendly and sustainable. While autonomous car-sharing services have been introduced as a very promising solution, an innovative alternative is arising using self-driving bikes. Shared autonomous cargo bike fleets are likely to increase the livability and sustainability of the city as the use of cargo bikes in an on-demand mobility service can replace the use of cars for short-distance trips and enhance connectivity to public transportation. However, more research is still needed to develop this new concept. To address this research gap, this paper examines the on-demand shared-use autonomous bikes service (OSABS) from a fleet management perspective. In fact, such a system requires good management strategies in order to ensure its efficiency. Through an agent-based simulation of a case study in Magdeburg, we investigate various parameters that can influence the performance and the service quality of OSABS such as the rebalancing frequency and the relocation type. Tests were performed for two different operational areas: the inner city and the complete city of Magdeburg. We conclude with different management insights for an optimized functioning of the system.

Students’ perceptions on bicycle facilities in campus. A case study at Universiti Tun Hussein Onn Malaysia, Johor

Increasing dependence on the private vehicles and motorised transport in the university campus have resulted in a growing traffic congestion and more demand for parking, air pollution and thus, contribute to high energy consumption. It is very necessary to encourage the use of active transportation such as cycling in campus among university students as higher education has been seen as a role model to outside community and has its own impact to community, socially and economically. The objective of this study is to identify students’ perceived current bicycle facilities in campus areas. The questionnaire in a Google Form were distributed through a social media platform (e.g. Facebook and WhatsApp) in order to avoid social interaction during pandemic COVID-19. A total of 328 respondents among postgraduate students in Universiti Tun Hussein Onn Malaysia (UTHM) was chosen to answer the questionnaire. Furthermore, data was analysed using Descriptive Analysis and Importance-Performance Analysis (IPA). The Statistical Packages of Social Sciences (SPSS) software version 26 was used to do the statistical analysis of the sample data. Results show that students perceived some of the bicycle facilities in campus that have a high level of importance value for students, are having a low-level performance, such as improper cycling paths and poor lighting at night.

A Survey of Technologies and Recent Developments for Sustainable Smart Cycling

Among the problems resulted from the continuous urbanization process, inefficient urban mobility and high pollution levels have been complex challenges that have demanded a lot of public investments and research efforts. Recently, some alternative transportation means have been leveraged as sustainable options for such challenges, which has brought bicycles to a more relevant setting. Besides the sometimes obvious benefits of adopting bikes for transportation, technologies around the Internet of Things (IoT) paradigm have been advocated as important supportive tools to boost smart cycling initiatives. Actually, new technologies can be exploited to improve the efficiency of bike paths and parking spots, while reducing accidents and enhancing the cycling experience of the users. Therefore, in this highly vibrating scenario, this article facilitates the understating of current research trends and promising developments, surveying and classing recent works. Since there is a global interest for the promotion of cleaner and more sustainable solutions in large cities, this survey can be valuable when supporting new developments in this highly relevant research area.