INTRODUCTION:

The automobile industry has witnessed a revolution on behalf of Electric vehicle. Due to change in life style people are becoming so possessive that they are using their own two wheelers and four wheelers for daily use instead of using a public transport facility thus causing traffic problems in major cities along with air pollution. Another concern is regarding the rising fuel price in India. A better solution to this problem is the use of electric vehicles which cost very less amount for charging at a time in addition to zero emission of pollutants especially CO₂ into the atmosphere.

The electric vehicles in India are in an introductory stage. There are huge challenges both practically and technically to adopt electric vehicles in India. The first and most difficulty is the lack of infrastructure such as charging stations.

The second challenge is the cost of the vehicle, which is very higher than a normal fuel combustion vehicle. Another challenge facing is the long charging time for the batteries. But the cost of the vehicle and the long charging time can be reduced by introducing the battery swapping system. Another way is leaving the concept of vehicle ownership and support the shared transportation system, which will not only reduce the air pollution but also helps in reducing the number of vehicles in the road which further help in reducing the huge traffic in the cities.

The electric two-wheeler market in India is also having a low share in market, compared to the normal fuel injection two wheelers. But considering the total electric vehicle market in India, they are having the largest market share. India will be witnessing a massive transition in to Electric Vehicles by 2030. Currently in India, there are more than five lakh electric vehicles including commercial, municipal, two and three wheelers. Many new electric vehicles have been manufactured in India in the last five years to catch the growth in demand for electric vehicles. The Electric Two-Wheeler market in India is also emerging on account of various government policies supporting the implementation, Growing environmental concerns, Increasing fuel prices, etc. Dock less scooter sharing service is getting huge reception in cities like Bangalore and Hyderabad. Bounce, a dock less scooter sharing Service Company deployed around 10,000 scooters as on June 2020. Another Start-up called Zypp E-scooters provides electric scooters rental service; provides electric scooters for delivery of essential goods and many more. These e-scooters are smaller, custom designed bikes which are suited for Indian roads. Anyway, India faces certain challenges for the adoption of Electric vehicles such as lack of charging infrastructure, price of vehicles, etc.

The research paper aims to find the perception of people towards shared e-mobility using electric two wheelers in Thiruvananthapuram city and further recommends operational strategies for its effectiveness.

REVIEW OF RELATED WORKS:

Shared mobility plays a crucial approving role for the public transportation by having first-mile and last-mile connectivity and new technologies led to the dock less bikes, e-bikes, e-scooters etc. which helps in solving the urban transportation problems. (Ghosh, 2020) (1) Thereby improving the accessibility and connectivity in crowded cities (Yanocha and Dana, 2018) (2). Even though bike sharing is found to be the best solution to solve the last mile connectivity gap, it is noted that the bike sharing business have not reached the level of success the cab sharing ones have (Hariharan and Sindhu, 2019) (3). The major shared mobility services in major cities includes Ola, Uber, Bounce, Yulu, Ontrack and Quick Ride helping in reduction of carbon footprint and greenhouse gases emission into the atmosphere. Small format mobility such as electric two-wheeler and electric three wheelers are gaining more popularity. In the Indian electric vehicle system, two and three e- vehicles will be first form factors to scale rapidly (Shrivastava, 2019) (4). The global sales are increasing at a rate of 14% annually (Hertzke et al., 2020) (5). The recent popularity in shared mobility in urban cities is due to the advancement in technology such as smart phones, positioning system, mobile payments and the largest beneficiaries of the shared mobility especially e-scooters are travelers who makes trip between 0.8 km to 3.2 km (Mathew et al., 2019) (6).

There were many complaints about e-scooter blocking the walk ways and sideways when parked illegally and based on an observational study it was found that, out of 606 parked vehicle 16% were not parked properly and about 6% were blocking the pedestrian path (Owain et al., 2019) (7). Lack of response from the customer side and theft are the major issue faced by the shared mobility platforms (Chanchani, 2019) (8). The availability of indigenous technology, availability of charging infrastructure, the fuel price in India are the major factors which determines or influence the electric vehicle industry in India (Phatak et al., 2020) (9) along with high cost of electric vehicle, poor purchasing power of Indian consumers and lack of infrastructure (Kumar et al., 2020) (10). The growth scenario of electric shared mobility in the cities may cause a negative impact on sustainable development on the city since it changes the electricity generation pattern in the cities and leads to find other alternative sources for electricity (Brdulak et al., 2020) (11).

DATA ANALYSIS:

Responses are collected by administering a structured questionnaire to various segments of people and form the primary data for the study with a sample size of 260 respondents. The data collected were analysed through appropriate statistical tools to arrive at the results.

Figure 1: Level of acceptability of electric two wheeler sharing service (Source: Primary Data)

Figure 2: Encouraging factors to use electric two wheeler sharing service (Source: Primary Data)

Figure 3: Discouraging factors in using electric two wheeler sharing service (Source: Primary Data)

Among the respondents, 47% of the respondents expressed their interest to use Electric Two-Wheeler mobility sharing service while 21% of the respondents are very unlikely to use Electric Two-Wheeler mobility sharing service (figure 1). Majority of the respondents (55%) wished to avail Electric Two-Wheeler mobility sharing service to reduce the petrol expenditure they incur on their personal mobility (figure 2). 37% of the respondents raised their concern about non availability of Two-Wheelers in the Specified location as a discouraging in using Electric Two-Wheeler mobility sharing service (figure 3).

Relation between purpose of travel and use of shared e mobility:

H₀: There is no relationship between purpose of travel and use of shared e mobility.

Table1: Anova test between purpose of travel and use of shared e mobility

Analysis of variance:
Source	DF	Sum of squares	Mean squares	F	Pr > F
Model	3	0.457	0.152	0.136	0.938
Error	256	286.681	1.120
Corrected Total	259	287.138

(Source: Primary data)

P_value is 0.93 which is greater than 0.05. Null hypothesis needs to be accepted stating that there is no significant relationship between purpose of travel and use of shared e mobility. This means that the customers are ready to avail the service irrespective of the purpose for which they use the service.

Relation between shared e-mobility with rising fuel price, reduction in air pollution, unavailability of service and weather:

H₀: There is no relation between the use of shared e mobility and a) rising fuel price b) reduction in air pollution c) unavailability of service d) weather

Table 2: Correlation between e-mobility variables

Correlation matrix (Pearson):
Variables:	Correlation Value	Results
Use of shared e-mobility and rising fuel price	0.321	There is a low correlation (0.321) between rising fuel price and use of shared e mobility.
Use of shared e-mobility and reduction in air pollution	0.344	There is a low correlation between reduction in air pollution and use of shared e mobility.
Use of shared e-mobility and unavailability of service	0.304	There is a low correlation between unavailability of service and use of shared e mobility.
Use of shared e-mobility and Weather	0.030	There is a low correlation between weather and use of shared e mobility.

(Source: Primary data)

Table 2 shows that factors such as rising fuel price, reduction in air pollution, unavailability of the service and weather are hardly related with the use of shared e-mobility. These factors do not have much consideration among people to use this service. So without considering these factors people are ready to use the available system of shared e mobility.

RESULTS AND FINDINGS:

Out of the total respondents about 47% are willing to use the shared e mobility. About 55% believe that the rising fuel price will encourage the use of shared e mobility. About 80.2 % believe that usage of shared e mobility will reduce the air pollution. And the study also shows that the shared e mobility system will be effective since the current situation of air pollution, rising fuel price and weather will also encourage the use of shared e mobility. People are running out of time in this busy world so this shared mobility system helps to reach their destination with less time promotes the proposed shared mobility system. Respondents who earn below Rupees 15,000/month are more likely to use Electric Two-Wheeler mobility sharing service in order to reduce their travel cost. There are regular city travelers for job purpose and educational purpose during the time slot between 7:00 AM – 10:00 AM, 10:00 AM – 12:00 noon and 4:00 PM – 7:00 PM. This means that when the system is implemented more customer traffic is observed in these time slot. Respondents belonging to different age groups have different perceptions towards Electric Two-Wheeler mobility sharing Service. Respondents who are aged between 18 years and 30 years are more likely to avail Electric Two-Wheeler mobility sharing service. There is a significant relation between age of respondents and their perception towards Electric Two-Wheeler mobility sharing service with a p value 0.016. Over 65% of respondents are comfortable in using Electric Two-Wheeler mobility sharing service in the current scenario as they strongly believe that it would reduce their travel cost. There is no significant relationship between purpose of travel (education, shopping, job etc.) and use of shared e mobility as the p value generated is 0.938 which is greater than the significance level 0.05. The rising fuel price, reduction in air pollution weather and unavailability of service, are hardly related with the use of shared e mobility. Without taking these factors in too much consideration, people are ready to use Electric Two-Wheeler mobility sharing service.

RECOMMENDATIONS:

Awareness about the shared e mobility needs to be widely done, many people are not aware of what it is and how it works. Since there arise a problem of theft of helmets in some major cities, the company needs to ensure that there is helmet inside the vehicle for the safety of each consumer. For this a sensor will be placed inside the helmet storage space to identify whether the customer has placed the helmet inside the box. Only after placing the helmet, the journey of customer will end. There will be a central locking system for the vehicle when it is idle. This will prevent the theft of vehicles from the hub spot even if there is no one to protect the vehicle. If the rider rides the vehicle outside the city region then the vehicle will automatically become idle. This will prevent the customers from driving the vehicle to outer city regions. A temporary rain shield will be placed to protect and encourage the customer during the rainy season.

Based on the research, a model is proposed detailing the phases of implementation of the shared e mobility in Trivandrum city. The 3 phases of the model are given below.

Figure 4: Proposed Model (Authors own)

The above model, figure 4 depicts the implementation of Electric Two-Wheeler mobility sharing service in a phased manner. In the initial phase, e-scooters will be made available in only major hub areas like IT parks, Railway station, Airport, etc. This initial phase focuses on giving awareness about the system to people. Battery swapping system will be introduced in these hubs for the purpose of reducing charging time. In the second phase, e-scooters will be made available to more places through designated parking slots. It also focuses on providing weekly and monthly rental service. In the third phase, certain value added services like Road side assistance, Refueling and puncture service will be provided along with the ride.

CONCLUSION:

Our Trivandrum city with the ecofriendly sustainable shared transportation system is not a faraway concept. It can be implemented in our city within two or three years from now. This system will change the concept of having owned vehicles for travelling. This will become the part of our changing life style. If recommendations are seriously considered, the scope of implementing Electric Two-Wheeler mobility sharing service is very high in a city like Trivandrum which is becoming smarter day by day. The findings of this study are expected to have consequences in implementing Electric Two-Wheeler mobility sharing service and developing strategies to build different business models. These concepts will become a solution for the increasing air pollutions in the cities of our country, will become an alternative solution for the rising fuel price, and is the best model for sustainable transportation facility.

REFERENCES:

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Received on 23.04.2021 Modified on 13.05.2021

Asian Journal of Management. 2021;12(4):435-438.

DOI: 10.52711/2321-5763.2021.00066