Public Bike Share Users Survey Results 2016

Bike share is developing rapidly in the UK. The Bikeplus Public Bike Share User Survey is the first national research into how people are using bike share schemes. It looks at the impact of these schemes on attracting people to cycling, the health and wellbeing benefits people report and how bike share schemes are influencing people’s travel choices, particularly in moving away from making car journeys.

The survey asked over 800 bike share scheme users in England, Wales and Scotland, and compared the data with over 3,000 London users surveyed by Transport for London.

The survey shows that 50% of people using bike share schemes are either new cyclists or increasing how often they cycle. In addition, a substantially higher proportion of women use bike share schemes than cycle riding their own bikes. Perhaps unsurprisingly, a majority of bike share users report that they feel healthier, however, a similar number also report feeling happier as a result of riding the
bike share bikes. The survey also suggests that there is real potential for bike share schemes to be a tool to facilitate people making some journeys previously made by car, by bike.

Not only do people switch from car to bike share bike, but bike share is commonly used in conjunction with bus and train to add flexibility and convenience to journeys. Overall public bike share could make a significant contribution to normalising cycling in our cities The results may suggest that providing easy to use, “sit up and beg” style bike for a small introductory cost, close to parks and segregated paths can be a good way to introduce new riders.

To read the whole survey, click here.