Photo by Mr. T in DC
The average Capital Bikeshare member saved about $800 on transportation costs last year, according to a survey published today by the bicycle sharing program. But that benefit is just one of many statistical facets of the multi-jurisdictional transportation network announced.
The survey, which was conducted over a recent four-week period, also provides a description of the typical Bikeshare customer. Although the system has tried to expand as much as possible throughout the District, Arlington, and Alexandria, its demographics are still catching up. Bikeshare members are more likely to be highly educated and younger white men, though slightly less affluent than the average Washingtonian.
But the system is making headway in promoting cycling as a mode of transportation. Four in ten respondents said Bikeshare enabled them to make a trip in the past month that they otherwise would not have attempted, while 61 percent said they made those trips using one of the big red bikes because the routes were too far to walk. Bikeshare’s administrators refer to such usage as “induced trips.”
By and large, all of Bikeshare’s features rate popularly with its customer base. When asked to rate various features on a scale of one two five, seven in 10 survey participants give fours or fives to Bikeshare’s website, station safety, maintenance work, and maps. The lowest-rated feature, riding at night, still gets fours or fives from 55 percent of respondents.
Still, Bikeshare’s membership isn’t totally satisfied. Forty-seven percent of those polled say they want to see existing stations expand, 43 percent desire more residential docks, and 36 percent want to see the system install stations in neighborhoods that it does not currently serve.
That last bit is put into greater relief by another study published today that measures Bikeshare’s impact on public health. Although Bikeshare exists in all eight of D.C.’s wards, membership rates from east of the Anacostia River are very low. Only 0.8 percent of survey respondents say they live in Ward 7, while 0.4 percent say they are from Ward 8.
Half of Bikeshare’s roughly 22,000 members were emailed invitations to participate in the survey, which was compiled by LDA Consulting. Of those asked to participate, 3,731 replied.
