Shared Mobility

The Benefits of Carpooling

Susan Shaheen, PhD
Adam Cohen
Alexandre Bayen, PhD
2018

Carpooling allows travelers to share a ride to a common destination and can include several forms of sharing a ride, such as casual carpooling and real-time carpooling. Because carpooling reduces the number of automobiles needed by travelers, it is often associated with numerous societal benefitsincluding: 1) reductions in energy consumption and emissions, 2) congestion mitigation, and 3) reduced parking infrastructure demand. In recent years, economic, environmental, and social forces coupled with technological innovations are encouraging shared and pooled services. Shared mobility is...

Casual Carpooling in the San Francisco Bay Area: Understanding User Characteristics, Behaviors, and Motivations

Susan Shaheen, PhD
Nelson Chan
Theresa Gaynor
2016

Casual carpooling is an informal form of commuter ridesharing operating in Washington, D.C.; Houston, Texas; and San Francisco, California. In contrast to new forms of shared-use mobility, casual carpooling has been in existence for over 30 years and uses no information communication technology, and is entirely run informally by its users. Researchers have been fascinated by this phenomenon and have conducted studies in the past, but there remains a lack of up-to-date quantitative data. This study examines the motivations and behaviors of casual carpoolers in the San Francisco Bay Area to...

Shared ride services in North America: definitions, impacts, and the future of pooling

Susan Shaheen, Adam Cohen
2018

Shared ride services allow riders to share a ride to a common destination. They include ridesharing (carpooling and vanpooling); ridesplitting (a pooled version of ridesourcing/transportation network companies); taxi sharing; and microtransit. In recent years, growth of Internet-enabled wireless technologies, global satellite systems, and cloud computing - coupled with data sharing – are causing people to increase their use of mobile applications to share a ride. Some shared ride services, such as carpooling and vanpooling, can provide transportation, infrastructure, environmental, and...

An Evaluation of Via Rideshare Service in West Sacramento: An Exploratory Analysis Through Surveys and Expert Interviews

Elliot Martin, Aqshems Nichols, Susan Shaheen
2019
The UC Berkeley Transportation Sustainability Research Center (TSRC) conducted an evaluation for the City of West Sacramento of the pilot Via Rideshare System, which began providing rides to customers in May of 2018 and is currently in operation. This analysis presents the findings from surveys and expert interviews. Surveys were deployed to both users and non-users of the pilot service in order to assess the behavioral impacts of the system on users and to...

Innovative Mobility Carsharing Outlook – Spring 2018

Susan Shaheen, PhD, Adam Cohen, and Mark Jaffee
2018

As of October 2016, carsharing was operating in 46 countries and six continents, with an estimated 2,095 cities and approximately 15 million members sharing over 157,000 vehicles. Asia, the largest carsharing region measured by membership, accounts for 58% of worldwide membership and 43% of global fleets deployed. The world’s second largest carsharing market, Europe, accounts for 29% of worldwide members and 37% of vehicle fleets.

Innovative Mobility Carsharing Outlook – Winter 2018

Susan Shaheen, PhD, Adam Cohen, and Mark Jaffee
2018

Peer-to-peer (P2P) carsharing employs privately owned vehicles made temporarily available for shared use by an individual or members of a P2P carsharing network. Expenditures, such as insurance, are generally covered by the P2P operator during the access period. In exchange for providing the service, operators keep a portion of the usage fee. Members can access vehicles through a direct key or combination transfer from the owner or through operator-installed technology that enables “unattended access.” Although P2P carsharing is more commonplace in the United Kingdom, Netherlands,...

Innovative Mobility Carsharing Outlook – Fall 2014

Susan Shaheen, PhD and Adam Cohen
2014

Two large all electric carsharing programs will be launching in Las Vegas, Nevada and Indianapolis, Indiana in 2014-2015.

In Las Vegas, SHIFT carsharing will be launching in late-2014. SHIFT will feature two services “CoreDrive” and “CityDrive.” CoreDrive will feature a fleet of Smart and Chevrolet Volt electric vehicles designed for short trips within downtown Las Vegas. CityDrive will feature longer-range Tesla Model S vehicles intended for longer trips around the greater Las Vegas metropolitan area. SHIFT members will also have access to a trolley service and SHIFT bikesharing....

Understanding Carsharing Risk and Insurance Claims in the United States

Susan Shaheen, PhD
Diwen Shen
Elliot Martin, PhD
2016

Screenshot of the title of the report and the authors

Carsharing offers consumers short-term access to vehicles, which facilitates better mobility and reduces the need for personal vehicle ownership. Carsharing does not require consumers to have automobile insurance. Instead, carsharing operators insure their members and are responsible for the risks and liabilities associated with vehicle use....

Evolution of E-Mobility in Carsharing Business Models

Susan Shaheen, PhD
Nelson Chan
2014

Carsharing continues to grow worldwide as a powerful strategy to provide an alternative to solo driving. The viability of electric vehicles, or EVs, has been exam-ined in various carsharing business models. Moreover, new technologies have given rise to electromobility, or e-mobility, systems. This paper discusses the evolution of e-mobility in carsharing business models and the challenges and opportunities that EVs present to carsharing operators around the world. Operators are now anticipating in-creased EV proliferation into vehicle fleets over the next 5-10 years as technology,...

One-Way Carsharing's Evolution and Operator Perspectives from the Americas

Susan Shaheen, PhD
Nelson Chan
Helen Micheaux
2015

Classic roundtrip carsharing has been documented as a strategy to reduce car ownership and vehicle miles/kilometers traveled in urban areas. The expansion of carsharing and other forms of shared-use mobility have led to a growing interest in understanding the latest models. In recent years, one-way carsharing has gained momentum across the globe with 18 operators providing services in ten countries worldwide. One-way carsharing does not require its users to return the vehicle to the same location from which it was accessed (in contrast to roundtrip carsharing). Users typically pay by the...