Understanding the urban mobility challenge: Why shared mobility providers fail to attract car drivers

Reducing urban car traffic has become a global policy objective. A vital element in achieving this objective is the availability of shared mobility providers offering sustainable alternative travel modes such as micromobility, carsharing, and ridehailing. Despite policy and industry efforts, shared mobility options have failed to change the travel patterns of current car users. The authors explore this urban mobility challenge through an empirical study of 807 urban travelers. Their results show that car drivers estimate travel costs conceptually rather than rationally and consider both trip purpose and length. In particular, car users perceive longer and recreational trips as cheaper per distance driven than shorter and work-related trips. A segmentation analysis reveals that habitual and technology-averse car drivers are particularly susceptible to this skewed cost perception, unlike more frequent transit users. Embedding these results in a case study of current shared mobility options shows that these options are ill-adjusted to the preferences of car travelers but more attractive to current transit users, potentially leading to cannibalization. Based on these findings, they outline several strategies for mobility providers and policymakers to attract car drivers to shared mobility options, thereby contributing to solving the urban mobility challenge.

• Record URL:
  • https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tranpol.2024.09.010
• Record URL:
  • http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0967070X24002610
• Availability:
  • Find a library where document is available. Order URL: http://worldcat.org/oclc/29485010
• Supplemental Notes:
  • © 2024 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. Abstract reprinted with permission of Elsevier.
• Authors:
  • Fitschen, Philip
  • Merfeld, Katrin
  • 0000-0002-5324-213X
  • Klein, Jan F
  • 0000-0002-0881-408X
  • Henkel, Sven
• Publication Date: 2024-11

Language

• English

Media Info

• Media Type: Web
• Features: Appendices; Figures; References; Tables;
• Pagination: pp 104-111
• Serial:
  • Transport Policy
  • Volume: 158
  • Issue Number: 0
  • Publisher: Elsevier
  • ISSN: 0967-070X
  • Serial URL: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/issn/096707X

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Automobile drivers; Mode choice; Shared mobility; Stated preferences; Transit riders; Travel costs; Urban transportation
• Geographic Terms: Germany
• Subject Areas: Highways; Passenger Transportation; Planning and Forecasting; Policy; Safety and Human Factors;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01934676
• Record Type: Publication
• Files: TRIS
• Created Date: Oct 22 2024 9:07AM