A Study of Financial Impacts of Pooled Rideshare Based on Assignment Strategies
This study explores the potential profitability of a pooled rideshare service in a simulation-based case study of two US metropolitan regions in the context of two fleet assignment strategies. A new method of obtaining more accurate fares is created to address scalability and accuracy assumptions relevant to pooling choice. Cases for private rideshare fleets, public mobility on demand offerings, and autonomous fleets are explored and analyzed. Two regions of differing types are explored to illustrate the impacts of geo-spatial demand density of profitability, with one region capturing a large urban and suburban environment and the second a less dense more compact small city. Results indicate that the cost of human drivers is prohibitively expensive, and regulation of driver pay extends the issue of financial viability. Despite these shortcomings, a more efficient rideshare assignment strategy is shown to increase profitability by as much as 60%. The smaller, more dense region was illustrated to experience a greater increase in profitability than the larger region when pooling was improved.