Bicycle Parking Use Patterns, Occupancy and Rotation Rates in the Streets of Barcelona

Abstract

Bicycle parking is a critical piece of cycling infrastructure and yet there is little known about who and how often these facilities are used. This study investigates the use patterns, occupancy, duration times and rotation rates of on-street bike parking in Barcelona, Spain. We sampled all city districts with rectangular plots (20 ha) that included 163 bike parking locations. We visited them 4-15 times during two field work campaigns in spring and summer 2021. We measured total occupancy, bicycle type (bike-share, kid, abandoned, private) and developed a method to estimate rotation rates, turnover and service levels. We estimate that Barcelona has approximately 18,730 bicycles parked on the street every day, of which 8% are dockless shared bikes, 5% are kid bikes and 3% are abandoned bikes or bike parts. We find that 10% of bike parking locations were saturated (average occupancy 90%+) and 30% reached saturation in at least one measurement. Contrary to our hypothesis, we do not find strong diurnal temporal variations, as occupancy rates are remarkably stable over the day across the city. We estimate that 35% of bicycles parked on the streets are for long term parking (1 week+) or storage, while only 12% of bicycles are short-term day-users. To improve the management of on-street bicycle parking, cities must maintain an updated spatial data set of bike parking locations and understand the patterns of who and when they are used.