Modeling the impact of dock-less bike-sharing system on outpatient trips

Abstract

Better transportation and medical service systems contribute to urban sustainable development. Dock-less bike-sharing system (DLBS) is an innovative, sustainable, and flexible travel mode that has been a worldwide spread. This paper addresses a pioneer research aims to explore the characteristics of DLBS usage in outpatient trips and its impacts on travelers’ mode choice behavior. The data sources include the survey at Beijing Friendship Hospital and the trip data from a DLBS company. The research results show that DLBS has evidently decreased the private bike usage by over one third and become a replacement. It is also an important feeder mode for public transport service to the medical service. Among 1,348 DLBS usage in outpatient trips, more than 40 % trip transactions are connecting the hospital and public transport stations. Over 70 % travelers ride DLBS only in a single trip while having other activity purpose after leaving the hospital. Multinomial logit (MNL) model is used to investigate the factors that influence the DLBS daily usage. Education and online payment have positive effects. This study can be extended to DLBS usage in other trips with similar characteristics such as appointment-based, short-duration, and multiple activities.