Ral-E-Bike Evaluation

This project will fund data collection for a natural experiment that jointly measures the vehicle miles traveled (VMT) and social participation impacts of an e-bike voucher pilot in Raleigh, North Carolina. The city will soon invite residents to enter a lottery to win one of 150 e-bike vouchers. A portion of these vouchers will offer a deeper discount to low-income applicants. The lottery is a natural experiment that allows us to evaluate the causal effects of e-bike incentives, and e-bikes themselves, on travel behavior and quality of life. We will collect data through a panel survey of lottery participants before and after vouchers are awarded, with those who do not receive vouchers serving as a control group. . We will additionally provide study participants with access to OpenPATH, a real-time smartphone app developed by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) to track changes in driving levels.