The Indiana Pacers Bikeshare Program – An Opportunity to Explore Research Questions in Geography, Transportation, and Public Health

Abstract

The Indiana Pacers Bikeshare program is funded by the Herb and Simon Family Foundation and overseen by the Indianapolis Cultural Trail, Inc., (ICT) a non-profit organization which provides access to bikes for a small fee to travel around the Indianapolis downtown area. There are twenty six stations and 250 bikes collated across the Indianapolis downtown area. There are two ways of using the bikeshare: a 24-hour pass or an annual membership. A user is entitled to unlimited 30-minute rides during the duration of the pass or membership. Each bicycle is equipped with a GPS unit. B-Cycle, a company that handles the implementation of the bikeshare system, collects GPS data of trips when the bike is in motion. In collaboration with ICT, our research team has acquired data from initiation of the program in April 2014 to the end of 2015. The dataset is large with slightly over 13 million records. Our research team is planning, at least, four projects based on this dataset: evaluating associations between built environment and bike use patterns, estimating physical activity accumulated during bikeshare use, differences in use by different membership types, and optimal placement of existing stations and planning for expansion of new stations.