The Science of Bike-sharing

TAU develops a high-tech tool to improve two-wheeled public transportation

The new environmentally-friendly concept of municipal “bike-sharing is taking over European cities like Paris, and American cities like New York are also looking into the idea. It allows a subscriber to “borrow” a bike from one of hundreds of locations in the city, use it, and return it to another location at the end of the journey. It’s good for commuters and for running short errands.

While the idea is gaining speed and subscribers at the 400 locations around the world where it has been implemented, there have been growing pains — partly because the projects have been so successful. About seven percent of the time, users aren’t able to return a bike because the station at their journey’s destination is full. And sometimes stations experience bike shortages, causing frustration with the system.

To solve the problem, Dr. Tal Raviv and Prof. Michal Tzur of Tel Aviv University‘s Department of Industrial Engineering are developing a mathematical model to lead to a software solution. “These stations are managed imperfectly, based on what the station managers see. They use their best guesses to move bikes to different locations around the city using trucks,” explains Dr. Raviv. “There is no system for more scientifically managing the availability of bikes, creating dissatisfaction among users in popular parts of the city.”

Their research was presented in November 2010 at the INFORMS 2010 annual meeting in Austin, Texas.

Biking with computers

An environmentalist, Dr. Raviv wants to see more cities in America adopt the bike-sharing system. In Paris alone, there are 1,700 pick-up and drop-off stations. In New York, there soon might be double or triple that amount, making the management of bike availability an extremely daunting task.

Dr. Raviv, Prof. Tzur and their students have created a mathematical model to predict which bike stations should be refilled or emptied — and when that needs to happen. In small towns with 100 stations, mere manpower can suffice, they say. But anything more and it’s really just a guessing game. A computer program will be more effective.

The researchers are the first to tackle bike-sharing system management using mathematical models and are currently developing a practical algorithmic solution. “Our research involves devising methods and algorithms to solve the routing and scheduling problems of the trucks that move fleets, as well as other operational and design challenges within this system,” says Dr. Raviv.

For the built environment

The benefits of bike-sharing programs in any city are plentiful. They cut down traffic congestion and alleviate parking shortages; reduce air pollution and health effects such as asthma and bronchitis; promote fitness; and enable good complementary public transportation by allowing commuters to ride from and to train or bus stations.

Because of the low cost of implementing bike-sharing programs, cities can benefit without significant financial outlay. And in some cities today, bicycles are also the fastest form of transport during rush hour.

The city of Tel Aviv is now in the process of deploying a bike sharing system to ease transport around the city, and improve the quality of life for its residents. Tel Aviv University research is contributing to this plan, and the results will be used in a pilot site in Israel

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Reference Link
http://www.aftau.org/site/News2/1039511600?page=NewsArticle&id=13823&news_iv_ctrl=-1

Courtesy
American Friends of Tel Aviv University

 

Share a car, firms tell staff

CHENNAI, India: Sriram has a cushy job with Infosys. His only pain point is commuting to the Mahindra City campus from Tiruvanmiyur. “Mornings aren’t a problem as everything works at fixed time times, and I take the office shuttle. But in the evening, I don’t know when I will wrap up. Invariably, I miss the evening shuttle back home,” he says.

Infosys encourages its employees to use car-pooling. “I post my requirement on the office intranet along with my estimated time of leaving office. Upon matching my requirement, I get my colleague’s contact number and we leave office together,” he says. Typically, a trip upto Tambaram from Mahindra City is Rs 30 per person, while upto Pallavaram the charges are Rs 40 and to Tiruvanmiyur it is Rs 50. “We find new friends, talk, crib, listen to music and reach home comfortably,” he says.

Car pooling is the shared use of a car by the driver and one or more passengers, usually for commuting. By virtue of pooling, the number of wheels on the road comes down, thereby reducing traffic on the roads. It is not just economical, but also helps in bringing people together.

High-speed mass transportation services are the need to solve Chennai’s commuting woes, but in the meantime, small initiatives like car pooling help people who aren’t resource strapped to move from point A to B without too much trouble.

Infosys is not the only company offering this on its intranet. Cognizant’s Lend a seat, gain a friend’ programme is widely popular.

“We have several hundred employees who are beneficiaries of our car pooling scheme. Cognizant acts as a facilitator of car pooling and does not track the charges,” says a Cognizant spokesperson.

As companies find that their employees are travelling longer distances to get to work, they step in to help make the ride a little smoother. Cognizant’s car-pooling portal records information about the kind of music commuters like to listen to, whether they eat in the car, and even whether they stop off at grocery stores to finish their shopping on the way back from work. “This helps the associates select a car pool that best matches their individual tastes and preferences,” the spokesperson adds.

The portal also has basic information such as the time and days of commute, do’s, don’ts and etiquette of car-pooling. There’s also a section where employees can their ideas to make the car pooling system more effective.

Pooling cars is not just an employee initiative. Sanmina SCI, which has a manufacturing plant in Oragadam, runs 15 cars for its management staff. “From the beginning of April, we’ve started running a tempo from MRC Nagar, in South Chennai, to our factory in Oragadam. We realised that quite a few of us live in and around the area. Rather than each of us taking out our cars, we decided to travel together. Laptops and wi-fi broadband connections will mean we don’t have to waste those two hours on the road we can work while we commute to and from the factory,” says Kumar Subramaniam, MD, Sanmina SCI.

No distance is far, if you are in the right company! Literally!

Reference Link
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/chennai/Share-a-car-firms-tell-staff/articleshow/5785616.cms

Courtesy
Bennett, Coleman & Co. Ltd.