Public Bicycle System in Hangzhou, China

Hangzhou, one of the most modernized cities in China, has experienced severe congestion, parking difficulties, as well as pollution problems since the boost of the car industry during the last decade. In order to ease traffic and parking difficulties, and to boost a sustainable transportation system, the local government introduced the Public Bicycle System (PBS) in 2008. Since its implementation, despite its popularity, drawbacks of the system, such as maintenance of the system, redistribution of the bicycles and technical problems emerged and aroused heated discussions among the users. Since the PBS is a user oriented project, the failure or the success of it depends largely on whether the general public makes use of the service. It is crucial to sustain and improve the current system in Hangzhou by looking at the key factors which influence the users of PBS. Based on the analyses of the interview with the government official, public transportation corporation manager, working staff as well as questionnaires from the users and non-users, this paper attempts to provide an insight into the design of the PBS, running status of the PBS, challenges the PBS faces as well as the users satisfaction towards PBS in the specific context of Hangzhou. Finally, the paper proposes recommendations to improve the current PBS in Hangzhou as well as offering useful references to other cities which are interested in establishing similar systems, especially for cities that have relatively similar city context and travel behaviour.