Does ride sharing help the environment?
Many proponents of ride sharing have said this:
The founder of Lyft: https://www.crunchbase.com/person/john-zimmer
"John Zimmer is the co-founder and President of Lyft, the on-demand ridesharing platform, that was founded in 2007 with Zimride as its first of two products built to create a more social, sustainable and affordable transportation system.
A UCLA professor quoted in the New York Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/13/u...May-Cut-Traffic.html?partner=rss&emc=rss&_r=1
"Juan Matute, director of the Local Climate Change Initiative at the University of California, Los Angeles, said that if more people used ride-sharing services — even just 3 percent of the population, he said — substantial reductions in driving in Los Angeles could result."
An MIT report with both EPA and a Federal Transportation Board authors: http://ridesharechoices.scripts.mit...nburgLevofsky-OrganizedDynamicRidesharing.pdfhttp://ridesharechoices.scripts.mit...nburgLevofsky-OrganizedDynamicRidesharing.pdf
"ORGANIZED DYNAMIC RIDE SHARING: THE
POTENTIAL ENVIRONMENTAL BENEFITS AND THE
OPPORTUNITY FOR ADVANCING THE CONCEPT"
With CEOs, the New York Times, UCLA, the EPA, MIT, and the Federal Transportation Bureau all chiming in - surely ride sharing must be good for the environment, right?
Well, as an engineer I prefer information rather than press releases. The arguments used by these above people are as follows:
1) Ride sharing gets cars off the road
2) Ride sharing reduces traffic because of fewer cars
3) Less traffic and less cars equals lower pollution and carbon (dioxide) emissions
Let's examine these arguments one by one.
Does ride sharing get cars off the road?
The answer is no. If you have the same number of rides, you can't possibly be getting cars off the road - if we use the standard definition of the road being where cars drive and noting that ride sharing as practiced by Uber, Lyft, and so forth is primarily a taxi replacement - not carpooling. Carpooling does get cars off the road as fewer trips are taken.
Ride sharing does get cars off the side of the road, as fewer cars are parked per ride.
Thus to say that ride sharing gets cars off the road can only be correct if we're referring to street parking - it cannot be correct for actual transportation unless fewer rides are taken.
Does ride sharing reduce traffic because of fewer cars?
As above, the answer is also no. If the same number of rides is taken, you cannot possibly reduce the amount of traffic generated by the cars actually providing this transportation. In fact, I would argue that ride sharing makes traffic worse. For entrepreneurial purposes, I and my business partner drove ride share for more than a month each in order to understand the space at the ground level. As part of our research, we compiled very detailed data on the rides we delivered. What we found is that the miles driven to pick up the passenger is quite large compared to the actual ride delivered. Here's what we found:
Excluding first ride/last ride in shift, airport rides, and commutes, the average ride distance we delivered in person was 2.25 miles for Uber and 2.52 miles for SideCar. However, the average "to-ride" distance - the distance we had to drive (unpaid) to pick up the passenger - was 1.27 miles and 1.8 miles respectively. Or in other words, for every mile a passenger was driven in Uber, 0.56 miles was driven to pick up the passenger. For every mile a passenger was driven in SideCar, 0.71 miles was driven to pick them up. Even the most strident opponents of free street parking say that the average distance driven to find parking is only 0.5 miles per trip (Donald Shoup, UCLA).
If overall numbers are used, the ratios actually get worse because the long airport trips nearly always result in an empty car coming back. Including those long rides yields ratios closer to 1 mile driven to pick up the passenger vs. each mile driven with the passenger. These are numbers from our own experience; the actual industry average may be different but is unlikely to be completely off.
So from the above data as well as common sense (note the above was pure point to point, no actual driving around looking for passenger distance was included), ride share rides actually mean MORE cars on the road per ride because of the long extra distances to pick up passengers.
Which brings us to the last question: Does less traffic and less cars mean that ride sharing can reduce pollution and carbon (dioxide) emissions?
The less traffic portion is clearly flat out wrong: Actual miles driven increases something like 40% to nearly 100% vs. people driving own cars.
The less cars overall might be true, but what is the impact of this?
According to this article: http://www.theguardian.com/environment/green-living-blog/2010/sep/23/carbon-footprint-new-car
"The upshot is that – despite common claims to contrary – the embodied emissions of a car typically rival the exhaust pipe emissions over its entire lifetime."
I understand this to mean that the pollution caused by manufacturing a car is roughly equal to the pollution created by operating it. If each ride sharing car is eliminating at least one car that isn't actually driven, then it would be safe to say that ride sharing is, in fact, reducing pollution. The problem, of course, is that few people buy a car in order to not drive it. The cars which are being used for ride sharing actually drive more miles per trip than a private vehicle - as much as 100% more, so its far from clear that the manufacturing pollution savings impact on overall environmental impact is real because of the additional miles driven by ride share - which is real.
Some people would point out that ride share cars tend to be very gas economical - like a Prius. The good news is that yes, a Prius generates less pollution per mile driven. However, if the Prius replaces a still drivable car already on the road, you don't actually save anything because driving an already manufactured car creates less pollution than buying a new Prius. If a Prius generates 1/4 as much pollution for the driving portion, it still represents 62.5% new pollution (50% manufacturing + 25% of the 50% for operating pollution) over the life of the car vs. the 50% operational pollution for the car already on the road. Note I'm being very generous here as a Prius still needs tires, oil changes, brake pads, etc and I'm ignoring the extra miles driven for rideshare.
I take this to mean that it is far from clear that ride sharing helps the environment or reduces traffic.
Ride sharing does potentially take a lot of parked cars away - which is great for those who still have cars.
What do you think?
Many proponents of ride sharing have said this:
The founder of Lyft: https://www.crunchbase.com/person/john-zimmer
"John Zimmer is the co-founder and President of Lyft, the on-demand ridesharing platform, that was founded in 2007 with Zimride as its first of two products built to create a more social, sustainable and affordable transportation system.
A UCLA professor quoted in the New York Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/13/u...May-Cut-Traffic.html?partner=rss&emc=rss&_r=1
"Juan Matute, director of the Local Climate Change Initiative at the University of California, Los Angeles, said that if more people used ride-sharing services — even just 3 percent of the population, he said — substantial reductions in driving in Los Angeles could result."
An MIT report with both EPA and a Federal Transportation Board authors: http://ridesharechoices.scripts.mit...nburgLevofsky-OrganizedDynamicRidesharing.pdfhttp://ridesharechoices.scripts.mit...nburgLevofsky-OrganizedDynamicRidesharing.pdf
"ORGANIZED DYNAMIC RIDE SHARING: THE
POTENTIAL ENVIRONMENTAL BENEFITS AND THE
OPPORTUNITY FOR ADVANCING THE CONCEPT"
With CEOs, the New York Times, UCLA, the EPA, MIT, and the Federal Transportation Bureau all chiming in - surely ride sharing must be good for the environment, right?
Well, as an engineer I prefer information rather than press releases. The arguments used by these above people are as follows:
1) Ride sharing gets cars off the road
2) Ride sharing reduces traffic because of fewer cars
3) Less traffic and less cars equals lower pollution and carbon (dioxide) emissions
Let's examine these arguments one by one.
Does ride sharing get cars off the road?
The answer is no. If you have the same number of rides, you can't possibly be getting cars off the road - if we use the standard definition of the road being where cars drive and noting that ride sharing as practiced by Uber, Lyft, and so forth is primarily a taxi replacement - not carpooling. Carpooling does get cars off the road as fewer trips are taken.
Ride sharing does get cars off the side of the road, as fewer cars are parked per ride.
Thus to say that ride sharing gets cars off the road can only be correct if we're referring to street parking - it cannot be correct for actual transportation unless fewer rides are taken.
Does ride sharing reduce traffic because of fewer cars?
As above, the answer is also no. If the same number of rides is taken, you cannot possibly reduce the amount of traffic generated by the cars actually providing this transportation. In fact, I would argue that ride sharing makes traffic worse. For entrepreneurial purposes, I and my business partner drove ride share for more than a month each in order to understand the space at the ground level. As part of our research, we compiled very detailed data on the rides we delivered. What we found is that the miles driven to pick up the passenger is quite large compared to the actual ride delivered. Here's what we found:
Excluding first ride/last ride in shift, airport rides, and commutes, the average ride distance we delivered in person was 2.25 miles for Uber and 2.52 miles for SideCar. However, the average "to-ride" distance - the distance we had to drive (unpaid) to pick up the passenger - was 1.27 miles and 1.8 miles respectively. Or in other words, for every mile a passenger was driven in Uber, 0.56 miles was driven to pick up the passenger. For every mile a passenger was driven in SideCar, 0.71 miles was driven to pick them up. Even the most strident opponents of free street parking say that the average distance driven to find parking is only 0.5 miles per trip (Donald Shoup, UCLA).
If overall numbers are used, the ratios actually get worse because the long airport trips nearly always result in an empty car coming back. Including those long rides yields ratios closer to 1 mile driven to pick up the passenger vs. each mile driven with the passenger. These are numbers from our own experience; the actual industry average may be different but is unlikely to be completely off.
So from the above data as well as common sense (note the above was pure point to point, no actual driving around looking for passenger distance was included), ride share rides actually mean MORE cars on the road per ride because of the long extra distances to pick up passengers.
Which brings us to the last question: Does less traffic and less cars mean that ride sharing can reduce pollution and carbon (dioxide) emissions?
The less traffic portion is clearly flat out wrong: Actual miles driven increases something like 40% to nearly 100% vs. people driving own cars.
The less cars overall might be true, but what is the impact of this?
According to this article: http://www.theguardian.com/environment/green-living-blog/2010/sep/23/carbon-footprint-new-car
"The upshot is that – despite common claims to contrary – the embodied emissions of a car typically rival the exhaust pipe emissions over its entire lifetime."
I understand this to mean that the pollution caused by manufacturing a car is roughly equal to the pollution created by operating it. If each ride sharing car is eliminating at least one car that isn't actually driven, then it would be safe to say that ride sharing is, in fact, reducing pollution. The problem, of course, is that few people buy a car in order to not drive it. The cars which are being used for ride sharing actually drive more miles per trip than a private vehicle - as much as 100% more, so its far from clear that the manufacturing pollution savings impact on overall environmental impact is real because of the additional miles driven by ride share - which is real.
Some people would point out that ride share cars tend to be very gas economical - like a Prius. The good news is that yes, a Prius generates less pollution per mile driven. However, if the Prius replaces a still drivable car already on the road, you don't actually save anything because driving an already manufactured car creates less pollution than buying a new Prius. If a Prius generates 1/4 as much pollution for the driving portion, it still represents 62.5% new pollution (50% manufacturing + 25% of the 50% for operating pollution) over the life of the car vs. the 50% operational pollution for the car already on the road. Note I'm being very generous here as a Prius still needs tires, oil changes, brake pads, etc and I'm ignoring the extra miles driven for rideshare.
I take this to mean that it is far from clear that ride sharing helps the environment or reduces traffic.
Ride sharing does potentially take a lot of parked cars away - which is great for those who still have cars.
What do you think?