Is Sharing Caring? Understanding Shared Mobility Impacts
UC ITS Statewide Transportation Research Program (STRP)
University of California Institute of Transportation Studies' Resilient and Innovative Mobility Initiative (RIMI)
NSF Smart and Connected Communities Project (NSF S&CC)
ITS Graduate Student Association
Transportation Sustainability Research Center Director
Innovative Mobility Research Lab University of California, Berkeley
Shared mobility—the shared use of a vehicle, bicycle, or other mode—is an innovative transportation strategy that enables users to gain short-term access to transportation modes on an “as-needed” basis. It includes various forms of carsharing, bikesharing, ridesharing, on-demand ride services, and microtransit. Also part of this ecosystem are smartphone “apps” that aggregate and optimize these mobility options, as well as “courier network services” that are seeking to disrupt the package and food delivery
industry. This presentation explores the different models that have emerged in the shared mobility space and reviews research that has quantified the environmental, social, and transportation-related impacts of these services. Questions addressed by this presentation include how shared mobility services contribute to social and environmental goals (and when they may not), what are the challenges and opportunities to this, and what the future could hold.
Susan Shaheen is a pioneer in innovative mobility strategies. She was among the first to research and write about the changing dynamics in shared mobility and likely scenarios through which automated vehicles might gain prominence. She is a professor in Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley. She is a Co-Director of the Transportation Sustainability Research Center of the Institute of Transportation Studies (ITS), Berkeley and Director of the UC ITS’ Resilient and Innovative Mobility Initiative (RIMI). She has a Ph.D. from UC Davis and a M.S. from the University of Rochester. She has authored 81 journal articles, over 160 reports and proceedings articles, 27 book chapters, and co-edited three books.
She served as the Chair of the Transportation Research Board (TRB) Executive Committee from 2021 to 2022 and as Vice Chair from 2020 to 2021. She received the 2017 Roy W. Crum award from TRB for her distinguished achievements in transportation research. In May 2016, she was named one of the top 10 academic thought leaders in transportation by the Eno Transportation Foundation.