Perspectives on e-scooters use: A multi-year cross-sectional approach to understanding e-scooter travel behavior in Portland, Oregon

Authors

Minju Kim
Nicholas Puczkowskyj
John MacArthur
Jennifer Dill

Document Type

Journal Article

Publication Date

2023

Subject Area

mode - bus, mode - car, mode - other, mode - rail, mode - taxi, place - north america, place - urban, ridership - behaviour, ridership - modelling, ridership - mode choice, policy - congestion, policy - equity, policy - environment, planning - surveys

Keywords

travel behavior, electric scooters, mode substitution

Abstract

Unique travel behavior patterns are observed as shared electric scooters (e-scooters) provided by private operators expand into U.S. cities. Three separate years of e-scooter ridership survey data from the Portland Bureau of Transportation’s E-scooter Pilot Programs were analyzed to ascertain the multi-year cross-sectional and demographic characteristics of e-scooter riders. A binary logistic regression model, descriptive statistics, and multiple regression model are used to analyze e-scooter mode substitution, trip purposes, and travel distance from 2018 to 2020 in Portland, Oregon. Since the introduction of e-scooter in 2018, respondents have been less likely to use their previous transportation, and especially vehicle trips were consistently replaced with e-scooter trips during three different periods of analysis. In 2020, utilitarian trips, work/school trips, and trips for accessing transit stops replaced recreation trips as the primary trip purpose. The travel distance model shows that e-scooters can help to reduce vehicle miles traveled (VMT) by replacing car and ride-hail/taxis trips. With the result of this research, this study supports shared e-scooters as a viable transportation mode in the future that can achieve several policy goals, such as climate change, congestion, first/last mile connector to transit, and equity.

Rights

Permission to publish the abstract has been given by Elsevier, copyright remains with them.

Comments

Transportation Research Part A Home Page:

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/09658564

Recommended Citation

Kim, M., Puczkowskyj, N., MacArthur, J., & Dill, J. (2023). Perspectives on e-scooters use: A multi-year cross-sectional approach to understanding e-scooter travel behavior in Portland, Oregon. Transportation research part A: policy and practice, 178, 103866.