Document Type

Thesis

Date of Award

5-2023

School/College

College of Science, Engineering, and Technology (COSET)

Degree Name

MS in Transportation Planning & Management

Committee Chairperson

Mehdi Azimi

Committee Member 1

Yi Qi

Committee Member 2

Fengxiang Qiao

Committee Member 3

Yachi Wanyan

Keywords

• Bikeshare • COVID-19 Pandemic • Negative Binomial Regression Model • Ridership

Abstract

A bikeshare system is a transportation service which bicycles are available for shared use by individuals for a short term at low or no cost. It is affordable to users and a healthy system for both users and the environment. It is a solution for people who do not have a vehicle and to limit the increase of private car usage. The study aimed to investigate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic outbreak on bikeshare ridership with a case study for the City of Houston. The data used for this study include ridership data for 2019 and 2020, COVID-19 cases of the city of Houston from the Harris County residents for the year 2020, and temperature and precipitation in Houston for the years 2019 and 2020. The methodology includes descriptive analysis as well as using Negative Binomial regression modeling to derive the relationship between the dependent variable and independent variables. According to the descriptive analysis, there was an overall increase in ridership during the COVID-19 period in 2020. The longer duration trips in 2020 are much higher than those in 2019, and most of the trips occurred during off-peak followed by evening and morning peaks. Moreover, the regression analysis revealed that the COVID-19 pandemic had a statistically significant positive impact of COVID-19 cases on the average daily ridership. The weekend indicator had the strongest statistically significant positive impact on the average daily ridership. The temperature indicator had no statistically significant impact on the average daily ridership and precipitation had the strongest statistically significant negative impact on the average daily ridership.

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