Rethink, Refine, Repeat: Tracking the Rise of New Mobility
A Swapfiets store in London (UK). The company has 280,000 members in eight European countries.
The story of modern mobility isn’t a straight line. It’s been full of experiments, failures, pivots, and sometimes surprising successes. From the early hippie-inspired white bikes in Amsterdam in the 1960s to today’s dockless e-bikes, bikeshare and other shared transportation systems have demonstrated that even messy, small-scale experiments can eventually grow into reliable, widely accepted tools for moving people—and reducing car dependence.
A Long Road for Bikeshare
Bikeshare began as a bold, if chaotic, experiment. In 1965, Amsterdam saw the “white bike” movement: free bikes painted white, left unlocked for anyone to use. Theft and vandalism quickly turned the experiment into a cautionary tale—but the idea stuck.
Over the next few decades, cities experimented with new models. Montreal’s Bixi launched a docked bikeshare system that showed technical feasibility and a viable revenue model. Fast forward to New York’s CitiBike and Washington, D.C.’s Capital Bikeshare—both built on similar hardware but very different business approaches. CitiBike initially struggled with overly optimistic financial projections and underestimated operational costs, while Capital Bikeshare became an early success story, largely thanks to realistic planning and strong government partnerships.
Dockless bikes and scooters later flooded cities across the globe, sometimes clogging sidewalks and creating new headaches. Carsharing and ride-hailing companies also entered the micromobility space, often using bikes and scooters to offset the public perception of congestion caused by cars in their fleets.
Another major pivot came with e-bikes. Initially slowed by battery technology challenges, including safety issues, e-bikes have emerged as a popular and practical alternative to pedal bikes, especially for longer commutes or hilly terrain.
Today, after decades of experimentation, mergers, and business model refinements, bikeshare has reached a level of stability. Cities can now rely on bikeshare as a recognized mode of public transportation. While research shows that even the most advanced systems contribute less than 1% to overall greenhouse gas reductions (2020 CAPCOA Handbook), they offer undeniable benefits for tourism, local economic development and first-mile/last-mile connections.
Bikeshare also continues to inspire private-sector “bikes-as-a-service” models. Netherlands-based Swapfiets, owned by PON (parent company of iconic US bike brands Schwinn and Cannondale), offers subscription bikes for a low monthly fee with maintenance and theft protection included. After years spent refining their business model, Swapfiets is now becoming profitable as it serves students and urban residents across eight European countries. Its success demonstrates the potential of subscription-based micromobility to remove barriers to cycling and introduce a younger generation to regular bike use.
Moving from Bikes to Pay-Per-Mile Insurance
Just as bikeshare required persistence and iterative improvement, another innovation in mobility has been quietly emerging: Pay-Per-Mile (PPM) auto insurance.
In the early 2000s, under the banner of Pay-As-You-Drive (PAYD) insurance, researchers and policymakers explored whether shifting fixed auto costs into per-mile charges could reduce driving and internalize social costs. Key milestones included:
Oregon House Bill 2043 in 2003 advancing distance-based auto insurance.
Conservation Law Foundation program with Plymouth Rock Auto Insurance, in Massachusetts, along with sponsored research showing the potential for per-mile pricing to reduce unnecessary driving.
A proposed 2006 pilot in King County (WA) with Unigard Insurance and Northwest Environment Watch (now Sightline) that was to be supported, in part, by USDOT.
In 2008, The Hamilton Project at Brookings published The Impact of Pay-As-You-Drive Auto Insurance in California by Jason Bordoff and Pascal Noel, part of a broader wave of research exploring distance-based insurance as a tool to improve efficiency, reduce driving, and promote equity. Parallel studies by Resources for the Future, the University of Minnesota Center for Transportation Studies, and RAND reinforced these findings.
Private sector efforts largely leaned toward Usage-Based Insurance (UBI)—tracking speed, braking, and location via GPS—to predict risk. Early programs like Allstate’s Drivewise and Progressive’s Snapshot offered low rates but raised privacy concerns. Consumers faced an either-or tradeoff: pay less or maintain privacy.
PPM products, such as Allstate’s Milewise and coverage form Mile Auto, evolved to consider only mileage, protecting driver privacy while maintaining the per-mile incentive. This distinction is critical: the motivation to drive less is highly sensitive to the ratio of base premium to the per-mile charge. High base fees weaken the behavioral incentive, while PPM products with a higher per-mile charge better align cost with usage.
Today, PPM remains a niche but growing option, with Nationwide Insurance offering coverage in the most states (44 as of this writing) and other major companies providing similar programs, but only in a minority of states. For consumers, the appeal is simple: pay only for what you drive, save money, and reduce unnecessary mileage, all while protecting privacy.
The Power of Persistence: Why Mobility Innovations Need Time to Thrive
Bikeshare, e-bikes, and PPM insurance share a common lesson: innovation in mobility takes time, iteration, and sometimes failure. Early attempts may seem messy or even unsuccessful, but each stumble is part of a larger trajectory toward stable, widely adopted solutions.
Whether it’s a student cruising a European city on a Swapfiets subscription bike, a neighbor running errands on a docked e-bike, or a driver saving money with a per-mile insurance plan, these innovations demonstrate that persistence, adaptation, and thoughtful pivots can turn early chaos into lasting progress.
For those interested in exploring PPM today, SmartGO provides an up-to-date overview of offerings from a range of insurers.