© 2017 IBM Corporation

Optimizing a bike sharing system

SERVICE OWNED BY TFL & MANAGED BY SERCO

Manages the London Cycle Hire Scheme (LCHS) since 2010. Bid for contract renewal in 2017.

Delivers the LCHS Service to Londoners, commuters & tourists. Requested Intelligent Decision Making in the public procurement.

30,000 people, mostly commuters, hire LCHS bikes every day. The record for cycle hires in a single day is 73,000.

2010 2018

315 stations 5 000 bikes

800+ stations 13 000 bikes

THE LONDON CYCLE HIRE SCHEME

ONE of the LARGEST BIKE SHARING SCHEMES in the WORLD

Serco Business Challenges in TfL Commitment

Guarantee quality of service• Penalties charged whenever the system availability targets are not met

(e.g. stations empty or full).

• Position the right inventory of bikes in the right place at the right time to minimize the penalties charged.

3

SERCO monitors the status of the Scheme and manage the bike redistribution in order to avoid stations to become empty or full.

4

Control Room Planners• Monitor the status of the system

24x7• Detect stations with issues

Forecasting and dispatching engines

Vans and Technicians• A fleet of vans balancing bikes between

stations• A team of technicians operating repairs.

Application flow

Machine Learning & Optimization FORECASTING / LEARNING

• Compute bike safety stock for each station.

• Compute an optimal bike inventory for each station.

5

SAFETY STOCKS / TARGET INVENTORY VAN & TECHNICIAN DISPATCHING

• Combine historical operations data with weather conditions and calendar.

• Forecast the number of pick-ups and drop-offs over time for each station

• Schedule distribution to bring the scheme to the desired state .

• Schedule collects and repairs.

Based on Spark MLLib Based on CPLEX Based on CPLEX

“LCHS experienced a record hire month in November with very good full and empty distribution metrics. These are very quantifiable results linked to the management of distribution done with DPO”

Results and Benefits

USER SATISFACTION

• Increased operations planning horizon thanks to forecasts and optimization.

• Reduced penalties for full and empty stations.

CONTROL ROOM TEAM

• Increased ridership and customer satisfaction with better availability of bikes and docking points.

OPERATIONAL PERFORMANCE

• Planners can focus on analysis and exception management rather than repetitive tasks.

• Reduced learning curve for bringing new people onboard.

6

SAM JONESHead Of Operations – London Cycle Hire Scheme

7IBM Cloud / © 2018 IBM Corporation