Bike Transportation Proposals at Universities - Term Paper Example

Such bike sharing services allows students or staff to share a bicycle with a given number of individuals. This has helped save of cost of purchasing more bicycles to cater for the high number of users. Bicycle sharing programs have become more successful than in the past with the introduction of modern tracking systems. This helps to keep track on the location of bicycles being used and also to curb theft. Through bike rental services, students and university staff are required to pay a given considerable fee for the use of a bicycle within the university premises.

Such rental services ensure the bicycles are well maintained by users unlike in the bike sharing process. Another finding is that the use of bike transport has been made operational through several university administrations making available to students certain incentives. This are made available within the school to promote use of bicycles. Such incentives include: a free parking lot with enough space to cater for the large number of bike users within the institution; security for the students and staff’s bicycles within the institutions premises.

This is evident with the report on Stanford University which has 12,000 bicycle rack spaces. However such a beneficial mode of transport has its own rules and regulations. The university administrations have come up with sets of rules and regulations to ensure the safe use of bicycles within the institutions. Some of these rules and regulations include: mandatory use of safety helmets and safety pads while cycling; obedience to traffic officers who monitor bike usage; one is not permitted to cycle too fast while in the institution; failure to obey the set rules one is liable to punishment through the payment of fines in regards to the broken rule.

Such rules have enabled the institutions to curb any accidents within their premises. A given number of universities such as Stanford University have introduced innovative bicycle services such as bicycle lockers for safekeeping, they also offer online bike registration for students and staff, they offer bicycle routes and maps to guide cyclists around the institutions, and also professional bicycle use training. According to graphical data it is evident that there has been an increase in the adoption of bicycle transportation in universities over the past few years.

This is seen through the average increase rate in percentage of bicycle users in several states in America by 2.25 percent. Areas such as San Francisco have noted a population of over 13000 users while Portland has the highest number with a population of over 17000. In the data it is conclusive that universities in areas experiencing favorable climatic conditions, such as San Francisco’s sunny and windy climate, are more probable to have a higher number of bicycle users. Also it is noted that these universities have a higher number of male bicycle users than that of females as it is stated in a report that America generally has 24 percent of the total cyclist population being women while 76 percent are men.

However this has been met by an increase in innovations to increase use of bicycles by women such as the introduction of carriers. These enable the bicycles to act as taxis if one does not wish to cycle. It also noted that bicycle usage has a positive effect on the physical and psychological well being on students and university staff. This is supported by an analysis showing that an individual is set to