Community shared bicycle systems, such as the Vélo'v program launched in Lyon in May 2005, are public transportation programs that can be studied as a complex system composed of interconnected stations that exchange bicycles. They generate digital footprints that reveal the activity in the city over time and space, making possible a quantitative analysis of movements using bicycles in the city. A careful study relying on nonstationary statistical modeling and data mining allows us to first model the time evolution of the dynamics of movements with Vélo'v, that is mostly cyclostationary over the week with nonstationary evolutions over larger time-scales, and second to disentangle the spatial patterns to understand and visualize the flows of Vélo'v bicycles in the city. This study gives insights on the social behaviors of the users of this intermodal transportation system, the objective being to help in designing and planning policy in urban transportation.

International audienceData gathered relating to the Lyon’s shared bicycling system, Vélo’v, is used to analyze 11.6 millions bicycle trips in the city. The data show that bicycles now compete with the car in terms of speed in downtown Lyon. It also provides information on cycle flows that can be of use in the planning of dedicated bicycle lanes and other facilities