The German Pedelec Naturalistic Cycling Study – Study Design and First Experiences

This paper presents the study design and first experiences of a Pedelec Naturalistic Cycling study. There are 90 participants: 30 bicylists, 50 Pedelec cyclists and 10 E-bike cyclists. The bicycles are equipped with a data acquisition system that records among others speed data and videos on the traffic situation over a period of four weeks. Questionnaires assessing current travel and traffic behaviour and changes thereof, motives and experiences with Pedelecs / EBikes are used when recruiting participants, before and after the observation period. A oneweek time use travel diary was used to collect qualitative information on the cycle trips and related activities. Despite a low modal share of bicycling in the study area there were no problems recruiting participants. Recruiting E-bike user proved to be a challenge as their market share in Germany is quite low. Participants are very cooperative even though the study procedure puts quite considerable demand on them. The data acquisition system provides reliable trip and video data, even though there are problems with the GPS data. Thus we expect an exceptional dataset that will improve our understanding of travel and traffic behaviour of E-Bike users.