Implementing a bike sharing system in

Santiago de Chile, Velib’ Model

Sebastián López Serdio

Professor Eric Britton

Sustainable Development Seminar

July 11, 2011

1

SUMMARY

1. Introduction 3

2. Air pollution in Santiago: A phenomenon of the modern city 4

3. Comparison between Paris and Santiago

4. Challenges to the implementation of the project 5

a. Security and infrastructure 5

i. Car speed regulation 7

ii. Traffic Calming 8

iii. Bike Paths 10

iv. Traffic Signals 10

b. Police and security 11

c. Technology 11

d. Culture 12

5. Recommandations & conclusions. 16

6. References 17

7. Attachements 18

2

1. - INTRODUCTION

Air pollution in Santiago of Chile began to be a real problem 50 years ago with the

explosion of automobiles and the city's industrialization. Currently Santiago is among the

most polluted cities in Latin America placed in second position just behind the city of

Mexico DF in Mexico. Moreover, the country's topography favors the accumulation of

toxic particles into the atmosphere from cars, industry and heating systems in homes,

among others.

For all the above, there is urgent need to implement more environmentally friendly

transport systems because it is precisely from here where the major pollution of the city

comes from. Some studies conclude that 55% of the pollution comes from cars and public

transport system.

With this information as a basis, and my experience living in Paris, there is motivation to

explore the possibility of implementing a bicycle-based transport, similar to the system

Velib' in Paris. Clearly the model is not replicable in the same way due to various factors

such as geography, city size, and culture, among others.

In this report I intend to make a first attempt to assess the feasibility of implementing

Velib' in Santiago determining the conditions and/or changes necessary to achieve a

successful project, or conversely, to argue why it is not a viable project in the capital of

the South American country.

3

2. - AIR POLLUTION IN SANTIAGO: A PHENOMENON OF THE MODERN

CITY

Although the phenomenon of air pollution in Santiago dates from colonial times, has been

in the last fifty years that the relationship between the city and pollution has led to an issue

endemic and inherent in it.

The factors that have determined that air pollution in Santiago and settle stable part of the

landscape can be grouped into two categories: natural and manmade. Among the former,

the most important is the geographical location of the capital, the city is located in a valley

foothills, almost enclosed by mountain ranges on all around which prevents smooth

movement of contaminants. This ring has only two major openings, one in the south and

another in the western sector. Winds are scarce and limited in scope and have the

characteristic of changing the sense that blow day and night. The dispersive effect of the

winds, therefore, is poor, and is rather to distribute the pollutants, especially particulate

matter in the entire area of the region committed. This is enhanced even more in winter due

to the weakness of the winds during this season.

Among the factors that are the direct responsibility of man are the explosive growth of the

city development and urban public transport in general. Like many countries, Chile has

suffered the effects of uncontrolled urbanization, produced by the migration of people from

rural areas to large cities and especially to the capital. It’s known all kinds of effects

produced by this concentration of population in urban areas, air pollution being only one of

them. For reasons of proximity to market and potential buyers, major industries have

tended to settle in the capital, in periods in which the criteria zoning and land use were not

yet developed.

Finally, 42.7 per cent of all vehicles circulating in the country are in the capital, estimated a

total amounts of 2 million plus all the public transport system. The urban road approach

was not designed for this amount of vehicles, which has meant in several traffic jams or

4

congestion of roads, contributing to aggravate the situation and also generating another

contamination, noise pollution.

In general, it’s outlined two factors that influence the production of pollutants, according to

the traditional model of fixed sources and mobile sources. If this is coupled with the

geographic, topographic and climatic effects noted above, it is possible to understand the

reasons why Santiago suffers the problem of pollution of the atmosphere.

In 1996 Santiago was declared a saturated zone in which it was established that the capital

was overtaken by four air pollutants. The most common pollutants found in urban air of

Santiago are carbon monoxide (CO), sulfur dioxide (SO2), nitrogen oxides (NO), ozone

(O3) and suspended particles (TSP).

3. - COMPARISON BETWEEN PARIS AND SANTIAGO

As a starting point, it is interesting to compare the cities of Santiago and Paris in order to

establish the dimensions of the project. In addition, it is useful to refer to Paris as a city

where Velib' is already operating with great acceptance by users.

Regarding the size of the territory, Paris occupies 105 square kilometers while the size of

Santiago corresponds to 640 square kilometers, in other words, Paris accounts for only

16% of the territory of the city of Santiago. In this regard it can be inferred that in a

smaller city, the easier would be to implement a transportation system based on bicycles

due to the short distances from one point to another, but clearly there must be an optimal

point in the relationship territory/inhabitants that allow a project like this to be profitable

and maintain a minimum of frequent users.

Santiago's population is approximately 7 million inhabitants, while in the city of Paris are

only 2.2 million. Here it can be inferred intuitively that while greater is the population

more likelihood to get a profitable project because it increases the potential number of

5

users, but there is also the factor of "lifestyle" to determine how many people would be

willing to use bicycles. In Chile it is estimated that 1% of the population regularly uses

the bicycle for transportation.

The number of cars in Santiago is 2 million as mentioned above, the configuration of the

streets of Santiago was not planned to support this number of cars so it is common to see

traffic jam and bottlenecks. This in turn leads to another type of pollution known as noise

pollution and also increases environmental pollution. This occurs mainly in downtown

Santiago where people converge from other areas for work or study, the main universities

and offices are mostly in the center of the city.

If we analyze the total population in conjunction with the number of cars, we find that

there is a relation car/population equal to 3.5, ie 3.5 people per car present in the city or

285 cars per thousand inhabitants. Probably these indicators tend to rise over time, not

decrease, but an efficient urban bicycle project could reduce the growth of these indices.

With these three indicators we can get the first conclusions necessary for project

development:

1. The size of the territory of Santiago is too big to think about implementing Velib

'in all places. From the ends of the city to downtown would take about 2-3 hours

biking. For this reason, it is appropriate to analyze the flow of people during a

normal day of work/study to determine the busiest districts and destination of

these movements.

2. The city's topography as a whole does not favor the use of bicycles due to the

presence of slopes and hills on all sides of the city. In this sense, only the central

area of the city would support the use of bicycles easily.

3. The city is saturated with cars and this may be an argument for the implementation

of public bike system but probably the impact of this project will be minimal in

the number of cars circulating.

6

4. If we took only 1% of the population of Santiago as regular cyclists, i.e. 70 000

people, the project would have a justification for its implementation. Probably it'll

be necessary a research about it in order to see if there's a real market in the city.

4. - CHALLENGES TO THE IMPLEMENTATION OF THE PROJECT

For the success and efficient of a project of this kind we should always keep in mind the

basic idea that the city must provide a minimum level of security for users so that they

choose to use this means of transport.

Under this premise, and for implementing this system in Santiago de Chile, at least there

are three specifics challenges: security and infrastructure, technological aspects and

finally the country's cultural variable; a brief description of the changes needed in the city

of Santiago to implement the project are given as follows.

A. - SECURITY AND INFRASTRUCTURE

i) CAR SPEED REGULATION

Speed regulations are important for this project because it is a factor in the accident

statistics and, in urban traffic is a factor that alters the quality of life of residents and

environmental conditions.

According to the Chilean traffic laws, the speed limit in urban areas is 60 kilometers per

hour for domestic vehicles under 3 tons and for buses, public transport and trucks the

maximum speed is 50 km/h. These regulations may be referred to modifications

depending on the municipality in each district of the city regulation that can go from 20

km/h to 80 km/h and must be marked with official traffic signs.

7

These regulations hardly will be changed because this would involve a process of analysis

by the government and the Chamber of Deputies, which is not a priority at the moment for

the country, therefore, the project idea is to adapt to these regulations and determine how

best to provide security for cyclists Santiago.

ii) TRAFFIC CALMING

An interesting principle is the "traffic calming" which aims to reduce risk to pedestrians

and cyclists in a city and improve the environment in which people live. Traffic control

involves a series of designs in the streets and traffic regulations that reduce the speed of

cars as pedestrians and cyclists share the road. Behind "traffic control" is the belief that

the streets are very valuable public spaces to be shared equally by all users. The

mechanisms for traffic control are simple, inexpensive, self-binding and easily modified

to accommodate emergency vehicles, garbage trucks and buses, among others.

Controlling traffic can reduce accidents, increase safety and convenience of pedestrians and

other non-conductive, giving more space for children to play, eliminate noise and pollution,

improves the view of the community, helping neighbors to rehabilitate and stabilize the

neighborhood and even avoid certain kinds of crimes.

The primary objective of most of the traffic control techniques is to make traffic slow down

at the same time allow access to vehicles. Reducing traffic speed is less dangerous, less

noisy and less pollutive. Slowing down also discourages vehicle drivers to use

neighborhood streets as a way of catching up. To control traffic on the road, engineers use

various physical and regulatory measures to change the psychology of the individual on the

street. The way the street is designed tells the driver what to do. Flat sections of asphalt

wide, straight tell the driver, "driving fast is good" but narrowing the lanes and the street

itself, making the road curve or using gardens, the streets are a relaxed attitude to

encourage walkers to say the conductor "you have to drive more slowly, this is a shared

space."

8

Traffic calming techniques are classified by type of problem that exists in the city. The

most common problems are related to speed, inappropriate traffic, dangerous intersections

and dangerous streets, and for each there are different methods for its control, for

example:

To regulate speeds are used:

• “Chicanes”: a form of extension of

platforms alternating from one side of the

street to the other, forcing cars and trucks

to take curved path along the street.

• “Mini Traffic circles”: Small

roundabouts installed in the middle of the

intersection.

• “Channels”: Painted lines or pavement

blocks of different colors to indicate to

drivers where in the street cannot drive,

narrowing the street and allows, for

example, the movement of cyclists.

9

Clearly this principle is a potential solution to traffic problems in Santiago but it requires

a thorough analysis by engineers and authorities to establish the feasibility of making

substantial changes. As the examples above, there are many other methods to calm traffic

and help cyclists in its posting, but it's not the objective of this work mentioning and

analyzes each one of them.

iii) BIKE PATHS

In Santiago there is a project to build 690 kilometers of bicycle paths by 2012 achieving a

network that covers much of the territory of the city from north to south and west to east.

If we take the worst case and the government’s project it's not fulfill, however, it seems

Santiago has bike paths that allow minimum movement through the city. (See attachment

# 1). The blue lines represent bicycle paths that are currently operating and yellow lines

represent the cycle of construction projects of roads, some are already completed and

others under construction.

Independent of the results, the government has the interest of creating this network and

encourages the use of bicycles as transportation. The problem in this case is again the size

of the city; hardly anyone could cross Santiago only by bike, due to distance, physical

ability or topography of the city. These reasons bring us closer to rethink the need to

select only some areas of Santiago to implement the bicycles.

iv) TRAFFIC SIGNALS

The current bicycle paths have clear road signs, very similar to those used in Paris,

including traffic lights, signs and signs painted on the floor. This point is not a major

problem, the difficulty lies in respect of these signals by the users and nonusers of bicycle

paths and also the decision to invest in them by the authorities and municipalities in the

different districts of the city.

10

B. - POLICE AND SECURITY

Probably in the first instance it requires the presence of security personnel or guards to

monitor the proper functioning of the system and guide users on its operation. On the

other hand, the presence of police as a watchdog could lead to greater respect from

people, moreover, they have the power to fine when someone violates traffic rules or

behavior on the streets. Clearly the police's role is a key to educating people about new

urban transport projects as well the police presence would help combat vandalism against

bicycles and stations.

C. - TECHNOLOGY

The technological challenge is related to how the subscriptions would be made, payments,

and retirement of bicycles from stations. Replicate the Velib' model probably is not

difficult but it's true that we have to pay attention to the means of payment due the

massification of credit cards is not as wide as in Paris, because of this, other methods

should be added in the payments, for example, cash.

The subscription can be done in the same way as Velib' through a web page only if the

user wants the service for one year. For shorter periods, we could enable the payment

system in subway stations with cash.

In Chile, the payment of public transport uses just one card called BIP! which is very

similar to Navigo card in Paris but it works different. For example, BIP! is an impersonal

card and the money spent must be charged directly into it at any subway station, unlike

Navigo where payment is monthly or yearly, having a contract with Metro de Chile may

be a feasible solution for the use of bicycles by providing the same technology used in the

subway.

11

D. - CULTURE

Probably the cultural aspect is the most difficult variable to change. Chilean culture,

specifically the people from Santiago don't have respect for forms of transport other than

cars because Santiago is not conceived as a city for cycling, therefore, the question is how

to change this behavior?

Surely the most appropriate method to change behavior is through strong marketing

campaigns supported by the Government of Chile, a campaign that should begin months

before the official launch of bicycles in Santiago delivering a strong environmental

message, respect, quality of life and welfare. Moreover, It may be useful the use of fines

by the authorities to condition the behavior of citizens.

12

5. - RECOMMENDATIONS & CONCLUSIONS.

1. One of the objectives of this project is to reduce car use to combat air pollution in

the city but also seeks to recover the user profile of the bike and turn it into

something massive, so that anyone can use this medium as the sole or in

combination with other transport.

2. To encourage use of bicycles is a key coordination between municipalities to form

a network that allows people to move to different areas of Santiago. Today, each

bike path is the responsibility of the district where they are located and it's not

necessarily consistent with the bicycle paths of other districts.

3. Segregate streets of Santiago for the shared circulation of bicycles and cars, at

different times of day, especially in peak hours of traffic congestion.

4. To promote cycling culture in the streets where cars pass 50 to 80 km/h is

necessary to build bicycle paths, while on routes where vehicles travel between 20

and 30 km / h, the solution to ensure an adequate flow of bicycles is to implement

segregated paths.

5. The activities must take place within a framework of security, therefore, in every

corner and vehicular crossing could be placed a sign to indicate drivers that

pedestrians and cyclists have priority.

6. Bicycle paths not necessarily have to be built on the streets of greater flow of cars

in Santiago. A good idea may be to enable smaller roads on streets with fewer cars

and lower speeds. In these streets you can easily implement the concept of calming

traffic, for example, building "chicanes" in every corner.

7. The Metro and public transport buses should allow bikes up, this is a way to

integrate both types of transport.

13

8. In first approximation, it seems that there are minimum conditions to implement a

means of transport based on bicycles but the main obstacle now is to create

conditions conducive about routes and circulation.

9. We must find an appropriate name for the project in Santiago. The word Velib' is

the merger of the French words Velo and Liberté. Replicating this model in

Spanish, it is possible to merge the words Bicicleta (bike) and Libertad (Freedom)

which resulted in the name of BICLI. Apparently it is an appropriate name

because it is easy to remember and it is similar to the word "Bici" which is

traditionally the way to say "Bicicleta" in Chile.

10. If we analyze the flows of people during a typical day in the capital of Chile we

find that there are highly concentrated areas that coincide with the center and

northeast sector of the city. The concentration is that there are major workplaces

and universities in the city. This analysis tells us that, at least in the first instance,

the project should begin in the following sectors:

14

The reasons for choosing these sectors are:

• It is the central part of town where many people converge each day.

• It's the area where are the universities and most important centers of studies, about

30 universities.

• It is an area with highly congested public transport and could be a help to improve

this situation.

• Usually the center is showing the worst levels of pollution in the city.

• Included the district where you can find the main train station of the city.

• It is the most low and flat area in the city.

• It is an area with low vandalism.

Clearly there are many people excluded from the system, but the idea is to allow

the transport within the area once already in it so people who go for work / study

as well as the transportation of persons residing in the sector.

11. According to the defined area for the project, the number of bicycles would skirt the

10,000 initially, but with a smaller number of stations, i.e., more bicycles per

station, this is possible because the city has enough space for stations larger space is

not an impediment as it is in the city of Paris.

15

6. - REFERENCES

Researches

1. “Contaminación del aire en Santiago: Estado actual y soluciones”, Raúl O´Ryan and Luis Larraguibel

• Web sites

1. http://www.recicleta.cl/content/view/656451/Mapa-de-ciclovias-de-Santiago.html

2. http://www.profesorenlinea.cl/ecologiaambiente/ContaminacionSantiago.htm

3. http://www.memoriachilena.cl/temas/index.asp?

id_ut=lacontaminacionatmosfericadesantiago

4. http://www.transalt.org/files/resources/streets4people/spanishversion.pdf

16

ATTACHEMENT #1

17

18