Electric carsharing and micromobility: A literature review on their usage pattern, demand, and potential impacts

Abstract

Shared e-mobility is a category of emerging mobility services that includes electric carsharing, e-bike sharing, and e-scooter sharing. These services are expected to reduce the negative externalities of road transport in cities, which is currently dominated by fossil-fuel-powered private car trips. In order to better inform the development and promotion of these services and indicate directions for further research, we conducted a comprehensive review of existing literature on the three shared e-mobility modes focusing on their usage pattern, demand estimation, and potential impacts. We found that despite the different vehicle capabilities, all three shared e-mobility services are mainly used for short trips, and their current users are mostly male, middle-aged people with relatively high income and education. The demand of all shared e-mobility modes share many common predictors: they appeal to people with similar socio-demographic characteristics and generate higher demand in locations with better transport connectivity and more points of interest. Shared e-mobility services can potentially lead to positive impacts on transportation and the environment, such as reducing car use, car ownership, and greenhouse gas emissions. However, the magnitude of these benefits depends on the specific operational conditions of the services such as the fuel type and lifetime of shared vehicles. The impact of each shared e-mobility mode is also expected to be affected by other coexisting shared e-mobility modes due to both complementarity and competition. Future directions should include studying the competition between and integration of multiple shared e-mobility modes.

Friend-Invitation Promotion Scheme Used in Electric Carsharing: Empirical Analysis and Policy Implications

“…Because the EVCARD relies on mobile apps and the elderly people have difficulties using a smart phone [28], it is not surprising to find out that a large proportion of members were young. e mean age of the studied members was about 34.1. is finding is consistent with the previous research, which found that the age of the majority of electric carsharing users was between 30 to 40 [12].…”

“…However, as the price of the private car became much cheaper, carsharing turned to be less attractive until the rising fuel prices and heavy road congestion have drawn the public's attention back to carsharing [8]. In recent years, shared mobility becomes a hot topic in transport development, and so does electrification [12,16,17]. Electric carsharing, a form of carsharing which rents EVs to people, combines these two items and is expected to inherit their positive impacts on sustainable transport development, including guiding the public to form a sustainable travel behavior [6], improving the accessibility and flexibility of the urban transport [12], reducing car ownership [5], vehicle kilometres of travel [9], traffic congestion [18], parking land use [18], and greenhouse gas emissions [11].…”

“…Hence, electric carsharing attracts many researchers. Liao and Correia [12] reviewed the studies of electric carsharing, and we refer interested readers to this review for further details.…”

“…However, some have argued that carsharing service would also have influence on public transportation usage [7][8][9][10], as it may induce public transportation users to drive, which can result in the increase of carbon emission. Electric carsharing can balance this conflict because electric vehicles (EVs) do not produce carbon emissions on the road and still provide satisfactory services to people [11][12][13]. It may be the first step to persuade people to give up owning a car.…”

Where Have Shared E-Scooters Taken Us So Far? A Review of Mobility Patterns, Usage Frequency, and Personas

“…They reviewed data sources, system characteristics, users, and impacts. Liao and Correia reviewed four themes for e-scooter use, i.e., performance, descriptions of the available systems, demand estimation studies, and impact evaluation studies [29]. They concluded that high-income and educated middle-aged men were more likely to be e-scooter users.…”