July 2017| 33
Most of the participants in the test group (72 percent)
had used the bike primarily for work trips. A total of 77
percent stated that the e-bike had made them cycle
more often than before and 56 percent said that the bike
meant that they rode longer trips than before. The extra
power from the engine was mostly used to ride faster
uphill. The second way it was exploited was to cycle as
before, but with less energy consumption.
One thing that really changed was the participants’
willingness to pay. This increased by more than ,
Norwegian Kroner (NOK), from approximately NOK 2,600
to around NO
,
. This change was significantly
greater than the change we saw in the control group.
So, letting people try an e-bike can be a simple, but
effective strategy to get more people to buy them, and
subsequently to get more people to use bicycles on their
daily travels..
Our second study was aimed at confirming these results
and in studying the effects of the e-bike on physical
activity levels. Again, we found that the total cycling
activity increased. For 45 people who had purchased an
e-bike, the increase was from
minutes to
minutes
per week. For the group of mainly physically inactive (28
people) that were recruited through the NGO (FIVH), the
increase was even larger, from 24 minutes to 235 minutes
per week. In the comparison group, there was no change
in cycling activity.
We measured physical activity from three statements
based on the International Physical Activity Questionnaire
A . To explore changes in overall physical activity, we
aggregated values for total moderate physical activity
(cycling for transport, walking activity and other MPA)
and values for total vigorous physical activity (cycling for
exercise and other VPA).
700
600
121.7
500
400
140.6
168.4 157.1
335.9 326.8
109.6
300
413.6
200
300.6
221.5
100
0
486.0
32.7
T0
T1
Customers
T0
T1
FIVH
Total MPA
T0
T1
Control
Total VPA
Figure 3: Total physical activity levels for the three groups at baseline (T0) and follow-up (T1)
The overall physical activity expressed as minutes per
week) changed for both the customers and the FIVH
group. For the group of customers, only the change in
moderate physical activity was significant, which was as
expected since this is the level of exercise that an e-bike
typically lends itself to. In the FIVH group, both changes
in M A and
A were significant. The control group had
no changes in levels of physical activity.
Our final study was also the largest. Again, the ob ective
was to confirm our results, this time with a quite large
sample size and with more objective data. Also, we
wanted to learn if the kind of people who were attracted
to e-bikes by a subvention program differed to those we
had previously studied, and if the e-bike had a different
effect on this group. inally, we wanted to see if the
positive effects the e-bike had on cycling activity lasted.
We spilt our sample of participants into different groups
those who had no e-bike those who had applied and
not yet bought an e-bike and those who had bought an
e-bike. We also divided the latter group further, according
to how long people had owned the e-bike some
participants had bought an e-bike prior to the subvention
program). Figure 4 shows how the total number of
kilometres travelled could be distributed for different user
groups. The data came from a travel app sense. AT
that automatically records all travel activity. Data was
collected for a month. In total, 700 people used the app
and some
,
different ourneys were recorded.
100% 1% 1% 1%
90% 15% 16% 13%
0%
10%
11% 1%
11%
68% 68%
2%
3%
12%
80%
70%
60%
50%
66%
71%
69%
73%
63%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
4%
14%
No ebike
4%
5%
5%
13%
4% 3% 3%
15% 15% 17%
4%
19%
Not bought yet Ebike <10 days Ebike <20 days Ebike <40 days Ebike <60 days Ebike +60 days
Bicycle
Foot
Car/MC
Public transport
Other
Figure 4: Mode share (kilometres) for trips by different user groups. Percent.
Approximately two thirds of all journeys (measured as
kilometres) covered in the period were taken by car.
or trips conducted prior to having bought an e-bike,
as much as
percent were taken by car and five
percent were taken by bicycle. The cycling share then
increased according to the length of ownership, up to
a maximum of 19 percent for those who had owned an
e-bike for more than
days. The increase was mirrored
in a decreased share of car use. We could not see any
difference in cycling activity between those who had been
motivated to buy the e-bike by the subvention and those
who had payed full price.