E-scooter Availability Versus Utilization Insights: A Geospatial Analysis

While the potential benefit e-scooters offer to communities to address short distance transportation needs have been shown, evidence that those needs are being met in practice is mixed. This study evaluates whether e-scooters are available to residents that are more likely to need alternative transportataion. This paper presents a geospatial analysis approach investigating e-scooter use conditioned on e-scooter availability to expand upon the micromobility literature.  The demand distribution for a short-distance transportation alternative was visualized in the city of Charlottesville, Virginia based on Census statistics describing transportation use, highlighting areas where micromobility need is the most salient. Real-time e-scooter GPS data was harvested from an open data feed over a four-month period from March 15, 2020 to July 15, 2020 and subsequently processed into measures of e-scooter availability and utilization at U.S. Census block group level resolution. This e-scooter data was then fused with demographic and built environment data and a multiple regression analysis approach was used to model average e-scooter availability and average fleet utilization to investigate which short-distance transportation need factors, economic activity factors, and built environment factors drive the respective response variables. Findings suggest that e-scooter fleet distribution is highly influenced by centers of economic activity while the e-scooter usage is influenced by indicators of residential micromobility needs. Further, this study suggests that e-scooter utilization could serve as a metric for reevaluating e-scooter placement to optimize residents’ needs which, if effective, may also lead to increased e-scooter benefits to a city’s residents.

• Record URL:
  https://annualmeeting.mytrb.org/OnlineProgram/Details/15688
• Supplemental Notes:
  • This paper was sponsored by TRB committee AME10 Standing Committee on Equity in Transportation.
• Corporate Authors:

  Transportation Research Board

  ,    
• Authors:
  • Tang, Tina
  • Alipour, Mohamad
  • 0000-0003-2018-134X
  • Poncy, Amanda
  • Harris, Devin K
• Conference:
  • Transportation Research Board 100th Annual Meeting
  • Location: Washington DC, United States
  • Date: 2021-1-5 to 2021-1-29
• Date: 2021

Language

• English

Media Info

• Media Type: Digital/other
• Features: Figures; Maps; References; Tables;
• Pagination: 20p

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Data analysis; Geospatial data; Global Positioning System; Mobility; Multiple regression analysis; Scooters; Trip length; Vehicle sharing
• Geographic Terms: Charlottesville (Virginia)
• Subject Areas: Data and Information Technology; Highways; Vehicles and Equipment;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01763863
• Record Type: Publication
• Report/Paper Numbers: TRBAM-21-03860
• Files: TRIS, TRB, ATRI
• Created Date: Feb 4 2021 10:57AM