While many bike-sharing schemes have been launched amid much fanfare, sometimes their popularity has waned. A number of schemes operate at a financial loss and depend on other profitable enterprises to cross-subsidise them and some have resulted in dumped and discarded bikes becoming an eyesore. In this chapter, we explore several questions. What are the characteristics of a successful public bike-sharing program? What are the characteristics and dynamics of the riders that use these systems? Beyond users’ own predilections and patterns, are there environmental characteristics that lead a system to succeed? Drawing on current knowledge, we first discuss docked bike-sharing systems. In the second part of this chapter we discuss the public discourse around dockless systems, a new generation of bike-sharing. This discourse tied to broader discourses that preoccupy contemporary society, including the pervasive role of technology, the different pathways to sustainability, and late stage capitalism. The reactions to dockless bike-sharing schemes are likely to apply to e-scooters too-– another micro-mobility mode that operates based on a similar concept.
- Chapter title: Docked and dockless public bike-sharing schemes: Research, practice, and discourse (Ch. 14)
- Authors: Dorina Pojani, Jiashuo Chen, Iderlina Mateo-Babiano, Richard Bean, Jonathan Corcoran
- Book title: Handbook of Sustainable Transport
- Editor: Carey Curtis
- Publisher: Edward Elgar, London
- Link: www.e-elgar.com/shop/gbp/catalog/product/view/id/16860/s/handbook-of-sustainable-transport-9781789900460/
