Cycling for a Sustainable Touristic Mobility: A Preliminary Study in an Urban Area of Italy

Gabriella Mazzulla, Maria Grazia Bellizzi, Laura Eboli and Carmen Forciniti
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Gabriella Mazzulla: Department of Civil Engineering, University of Calabria, 87036 Rende, Italy
Maria Grazia Bellizzi: Department of Civil Engineering, University of Calabria, 87036 Rende, Italy
Laura Eboli: Department of Civil Engineering, University of Calabria, 87036 Rende, Italy
Carmen Forciniti: Department of Civil Engineering, University of Calabria, 87036 Rende, Italy

IJERPH, 2021, vol. 18, issue 24, 1-12

Abstract: This study wants to give a contribution for the investigation of sustainable mobility with positive consequences on public health implementing policies starting from cyclists’ perceptions. Data were collected by interviewing cyclists along three bike lanes of an urban area of southern Italy through a face-to-face survey. The survey was conducted in Autumn 2019, interviewing a sample of 129 cyclists. In order to identify the critical aspects of the bike paths, both an importance-performance analysis (IPA) and a gap-IPA were performed. The average values of the cyclists’ perceptions of each aspect have been considered as performance values. The importance values have been obtained by performing a principal component analysis (PCA), which was helpful also for better defining the service quality phenomenon. From the PCA, six latent constructs can be identified as: “Physical Nuisance”; “Non-physical Nuisance”; “Physical Comfort”; “Non-physical Comfort”; “Protection”; and “Ambience”. The results of Gap-IPA confirmed that the criticalities of the bike paths relate to the degree of protection in relation to accidents, and to the degree of nuisance caused by pollution and opposing pedestrians along the path. Based on the conducted analyses, sustainable tourism implementing policies should be oriented in solving the emerged criticalities of the existing bike paths. The results of Gap-IPA are very intuitive and can certainly be helpful for identifying the most convenient strategies.

Keywords: bike lane; cycling; sustainable touristic mobility; service quality; public health (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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