User-Based Vehicle Relocation Techniques for Multiple-Station Shared-Use Vehicle Systems

ABSTRACT Multiple-station shared-use vehicle systems allow users to travel between different activity centers and are well suited for resort communities, recreational areas, as well as university and corporate campuses. In this type of shared-use vehicle system, trips are more likely to be one-way each time, differing from other shared-use vehicle system models such as neighborhood carsharing and station cars where round-trips are more prevalent. Although convenient to users, a multiple-station system can suffer from a vehicle distribution problem. As vehicles are used throughout the day, they may become disproportionally distributed among the stations. As a result, it is necessary on occasion to relocate vehicles from one station to another. Relocations can be performed by system staff, which can be cumbersome and costly. In order to alleviate the distribution problem and reduce the number or relocations, we introduce two user-based relocation mechanisms called trip joining (or ridesharing) or trip splitting. When the system realizes that it is becoming imbalanced, it urges users that have more than one passenger to take separate vehicles when more vehicles are needed at the destination station (trip splitting). Conversely, if two users are at the origin station at the same time traveling to the same destination, the system can urge them to rideshare (trip joining). We have implemented this concept both on a real-world university campus shared vehicle system and in a high-fidelity computer simulation model. The model results show that there can be as much as a 42% reduction in the number of relocations using these techniques.