Within the research activities of the H2020 DIAMOND project, the Use Case ‘Vehicle (Bike) Sharing Fleet Management’ is focused on the investigation of women’s needs and expectations as users of the bike-sharing service managed by Syndicat Mixte Autolib et Velib Métropole (VELIB) in the territory of Paris Region-Petite Couronne (France). This is aimed at supporting the definition of guidelines and policies for the inclusion of women’s needs in the design of future bike-sharing transport services.
In this context, Systematica carried out extensive research based on GIS-Geographic Information Systems for the analysis of Structured Open Data. This was aimed at identifying a short list of suitable bike-sharing docking stations, which were further characterized through: Structured Proprietary Data focused on travel demand; Onsite Observations focused on universal design indicators; UESI Survey Questionnaires focused on women’s concerns, needs and expectations; and Social Media Data from Twitter focused on the opinion of the end-users. Results showed that women use the VELIB’s bike-sharing service much less than men, since they are more concerned about accessibility, safety and security issues, social constraints, weather and topography.
The results of this research activity has been published in the Special Issue “Mobility for Sustainable Societies: Challenges and Opportunities” of the scientific Journal Sustainability: Gorrini, A., Choubassi, R., Messa, F., Saleh, W., Ababio-Donkor, A., Leva, M.C., D’Arcy, L., Fabbri, F., Laniado, D., Aragón, P. (2021). Unveiling Women’s Needs and Expectations as Users of Bike Sharing Services: The H2020 DIAMOND Project. Sustainability, 13, 5241. https://doi.org/10.3390/su13095241
Abstract
Within the objectives of the H2020 DIAMOND project, the paper investigates women’s needs and expectations as users of the bike-sharing service managed by Syndicat Mixte Autolib et Velib Métropole in the territory of Paris Region-Petite Couronne (France). The paper presents a thematic literature review focused on gender inclusion in bike-sharing schemes. The proposed methodological approach is based on (i) Geographic Information Systems for the analysis of geolocated open datasets related to land, sociodemographic and mobility characteristics of the areas surrounding each docking stations. This was aimed at identifying a short list of suitable bike-sharing docking stations, which were further characterized through: (ii) structured proprietary data focused on travel demand; (iii) onsite observations focused on universal design indicators; (iv) survey questionnaires focused on women’s concerns, needs and expectations; and (v) social media data from Twitter focused on the opinion of the end-users. Results showed that women use the VELIB’s bike-sharing service much less than men (about 30% of the total number of users), since they are more concerned about the following issues: accessibility (e.g., availability of bikes at the docking stations, distance to the nearest station, type and quality of the cycle paths); safety and security (e.g., perception of danger and insecurity while cycling and using the current bicycle infrastructures); social constraints (e.g., perceptions and cultural stigmatization associated with cycling and bike-sharing); weather and topography (e.g., impact of weather and the urban terrain on cycling and bike-sharing). The final aim of the H2020 DIAMOND project is to support the definition of guidelines and policies for the inclusion of women’s needs in the design of future bike-sharing services.