Spatio-Temporal Usage Patterns of Dockless Bike-Sharing Service Linking to a Metro Station: A Case Study in Shanghai, China

Qiang Yan, Kun Gao, Lijun Sun and Minhua Shao
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Qiang Yan: School of Transportation Engineering, Tongji University, 4800 Cao’an Highway, Shanghai 201804, China
Kun Gao: Department of Architecture and Civil Engineering, Chalmers University of Technology, SE-412 96 Gothenburg, Sweden
Lijun Sun: School of Transportation Engineering, Tongji University, 4800 Cao’an Highway, Shanghai 201804, China
Minhua Shao: School of Transportation Engineering, Tongji University, 4800 Cao’an Highway, Shanghai 201804, China

Sustainability, 2020, vol. 12, issue 3, 1-14

Abstract: The dockless bike-sharing (DLBS) system serves as a link between metro stations and travelers’ destinations (or originations). This paper aims to uncover spatio-temporal usage patterns of dockless bike-sharing service linking to metro stations for supporting scientific planning and management of the dockless bike-sharing system. A powerful visualization tool was used to analyze the differences in usage patterns in workdays and weekends. The travel distance distributions of using dockless bike-sharing near metro stations were investigated to shed light on the service area of the dockless bike-sharing system. Agglomerative hierarchical clustering was applied to analyze differences in usage patterns of metro stations located in different areas. The results show that the usage patterns of dockless bike-sharing on weekends are different from those on workdays. The average travel distance using the dockless bike-sharing system at weekends is significantly larger than that of workdays. The travel distance distribution could be nicely fitted by the Fréchet distribution of the Generalized Extreme Value (GEV) distribution family. The usage characteristics of shared bikes are correlated with land use and population density around metro stations. No matter in urban or suburban areas, there is a great demand for bike-sharing in densely populated areas with intensive land development, such as university towns in suburban areas. This study improves the understandings regarding the usage patterns of the DLBS system serving as a link between the final destinations (or originations) and metro stations. The results can be helpful to the operation and demand management of DLBS.

Keywords: dockless bike-sharing; usage pattern; travel distance; hierarchical clustering (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

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