Electrically assisted bicycles are anticipated to become an effective tool to limit not only the use of cars in cities but also their negative impact on health, the environment, and passenger transportation in cities. In this paper, we examine the effects of implementing the first fully electric bike (e-bike) sharing system in the Metropolitan Area of Gdańsk–Gdynia–Sopot in Northern Poland, where no other bike sharing system had been introduced before. The aims of this article were to determine the impact of the new e-bike sharing system on the modal choice of citizens, identify barriers to its usage, and find differences between the usage of the system in the core of the metropolitan area and in the suburbs. We used two primary data sets: the survey data collected using the computer-assisted personal interviewing technique (CAPI technique) and the data automatically acquired from the website that monitored the system activities. We performed the analysis by using nonparametric tests and correspondence analysis. We found no evidence suggesting that e-bike sharing can replace large number of private car trips, but we found it likely to be competitive to carsharing, moped, and taxi services. E-bike sharing competes also with public transportation services, but it is also used as the first/last mile of the transportation supplementing public transport system. The major barrier to using this system in central cities of the metropolitan area was the lack of available public bikes, and possession of private bicycles, whereas for residents of the suburbs, the obstacles were the need to transport children, the high price of the bicycle rental/subscription, and the long distance to the docking stations.
Celem niniejszego artykułu jest określenie efektywności produktów emerytalnych oferowanych przez zakłady ubezpieczeń na życie z punktu widzenia klientów tych instytucji, na przykładzie indywidualnych kont emerytalnych. W artykule zaprezentowano znaczenie produktów oferowanych przez zakłady ubezpieczeń na życie w polskim systemie emerytalnym. Scharakteryzowano zasady funkcjonowania indywidualnych kont emerytalnych oferowanych przez ubezpieczycieli oraz ich wpływ na przydatność tej formy zabezpieczenia z punktu widzenia konsumentów. Ponadto zaprezentowano wyniki badania efektywności inwestycyjnej osiąganej przez ubezpieczeniowe fundusze kapitałowe działające w ramach IKE w latach 2005–2015. Badania wskazują, że oferowanie IKE jako samodzielnych produktów ubezpieczeniowych należy uznać za rozwiązanie mało korzystne z punktu widzenia osób gromadzących oszczędności emerytalne.
Reducing emissions of pollutants from transport is clearly one of the main challenges of the constantly developing world. Because the environmental impact of different means of transport is significant, it is necessary to cut down on fossil fuels and turn to more eco-friendly solutions, e.g., electric vehicles. Almost all European countries are now adapting their transport policies to this new paradigm. Nonetheless, due to large economic disparities, these processes are currently at different levels of implementation in Western and Eastern Europe. The main focus is on private electric cars and more traditional means of transport, rather than water trams. This article presents possible means of developing water tram lines in Gdańsk served by hybrid or full-electric vehicles. The analysis presented herein reflects the multidimensional nature of the issue. The article provides data on the socio-economic situation in the city, technical issues related to the implementation of such tram lines, and the possible consequences of introducing a new means of transportation into the existing system. A key part of the analysis is the identification of anticipated economic and environmental consequences of introducing both hybrid and full-electric vehicles into the system. A comprehensive socio-economic and technical-environmental analysis of the possibilities of developing urban electromobility in the form of urban passenger shipping in post-communist countries, such as that presented in this paper, has not been previously published.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.