Summary

TRANSBICI is a three-year research project financed by the Spanish Ministry of Science National Plan I+D+i. By analysing travel behaviour, the project will model the real and potential use of bicycles in urban areas.

Objectives

Its main objectives are:

1.  To identify and measure factors influencing cycling mode choice, including cultural, social, spatial, urban, economic, and  subjective aspects;
2.  To develop a new model for travel demand analysis, adapted to include cycling trips in urban areas with low cycling use, in order to implement effective strategies to increase cycling modal share.
3. To develop a GIS model of optimal bikeways networks design and a GIS model of optimal location for bike-sharing stations.

Case study and ongoing activities

The areas of analysis are the cities of Madrid and Vitoria-Gasteiz. In both cities, to varying degrees, an integrated set of multi-level policies are being implemented. Our research strategy lies in analysing cycling mode choice behavior, and how it is influenced by factors driven by public policy. To do this the project implements two main methodologies:

1. A Longitudinal Panel Survey, involving 736 workers and students, covering various aspects related to the perception of cycling as part of their commuting trip. The first wave of the survey was carried out in May 2012
2. The collecting of Panel Survey interviewees´ and others volunteers cycling routes, in order to analyse the perceived data (collected through telephone surveys) in comparison to the real data of trips collected through GPS smartphones.

Expected results

As a result, a set of new research findings are expected:

1.  A definition of the structure of a new transport demand model that considers bicycle options in urban areas.
2.  The identification of psychosocial factors influencing the use of bicycles in urban contexts.
3. New methodological developments to combine transport quantitative data (traffic counts, trip time and cost) with other data coming from research in urban structure (accessibility, network density, reliability, etc) and in social-psychology (individual perceptions of cost & benefits, safety, health, environmental friendly behaviour, etc)
4. A definition of transport strategies to develop friendly cities for cyclists and pedestrians.

Research group

The project has a multidisciplinary approach combining Transport Economics, Urban Geography and Social Psychology methods and techniques. It is coordinated by TRANSYT, the Transport Research Centre of the Universidad Politecnica de Madrid (UPM), in cooperation with the Department of Human Geography at the Madrid Complutense University (UCM), and the Department of Social Psychology of Organizations at UNED