Capital Bikeshare and Transit

That's the title of a recent paper on the subject of how bicycle sharing and transit complement each other. The subtitle is "Does Capital Bikeshare Affect Metrorail Ridership in Washington, D.C.?" and it reads better than the power point presentation I linked to last month. The study authors wish to determine if bikesharing is a substitute for transit (like coffee and tea) or a complement to it (like sugar and coffee) - noting that it can be, and likely is, both. But they determine that it is more a complement than a substitute.

Capital Bikeshare station ridership was found significantly associated with Metrorail ridership. Results show that a 10% increase in bicycle sharing ridership will lead to 2.8% increase in transit ridership. This result is crucial for the current TOD development. With easier access to transit station, bikeshare program will provide higher access to “first mile” and “last mile” of transit.

The resulting conclusions are that 

• Adding bicycle sharing stations in TOD areas and densify station network are strategies for cultivating successful program in urban areas.

• The O-D analysis demonstrated the success of adding new stations in Alexander and Arlington, VA, thus the demand in suburbia for bicycle sharing.

• Bing proximate to transit stations is the key role for the CaBi program’s success in these two areas. Therefore, the co-location of major transit stations and Cabi stations should be prioritized when considering expanding CaBi program to suburbs in the future.

• in terms of analysis framework for modeling and predicting bicycling/bicycle sharing use, transit usage shouldn’t be neglected (though, the authors note that it often is).

• The regression results show that the bikeshare program has begun to alter people’s travel behavior by providing options to access public transit. 

Additionally, on seasonal impacts the study adds numbers to things we probably would've guessed to be true.

It is observed that the summer season, despite the hot weather, the number of trips are
higher, making the second and third quarters the seasons with highest trips. This could be a result of many factors, such as increased number of tourists in the region in summer months, preference to be outdoors in the summer time. The significant increase in bicycle sharing trips in the Tidal Basin and the National Mall in the third quarter to more than 1,000 trips while it remained lower in the rest of year suggests that recreational trips has a role in the increase.

One exception to this finding that the warmer weather induces more bikeshare ridership is universities. American University, located in the Northeast D.C., has been an important origin/destination for bicycle sharing trips between Van Ness-UDC Metro and Dupont Circle stations. In each of the first and fourth quarters, more than 100 trips were generated. However, the number of bikeshare trips dropped below 100 trips in the second and third quarters. One explanation could be that university students are major users of Capital Bicycle\ sharing program and during the summer, the ridership dramatically decreases since students leave the city for the summer