Bike sharing systems implementation impact on emissions, for cyclist preferred routes in urban areas

Abstract

Southern European countries such as Portugal still have a low bicycle share (up to 1%). Therefore, it is fundamental to research the potential benefits and drawbacks of modal shifts. This work analyses the implementation of a bike-sharing system (BSS) and its expected implications in emission reductions from road traffic for the case study of Coimbra city, Portugal. Although many different pollutants result from road traffic, we focused on small Particulate Matter (PM2.5) due to its harmful effects on human health. The methodology considers an integrated set of models for a) estimation of potential demand for the use of bike-sharing; b) mobility studies for the analysis of travel behavior; c) optimization modeling for the location of the bike-sharing stations and d) traffic emission modeling, to estimate the reduction of emissions due to bike-sharing modal shift. We considered two different potential scenarios for the location of bike stations. A modal share shift from car use toward bicycle in each is assumed, and the consequent traffic reduction and the associated emissions reduction are analyzed. The results show a non-homogeneous relation between traffic reduction and emission reduction across the urban space, achieving 12.5% of daily PM2.5 emissions in some urban roads.