Geography over Income: The Electric Divide and the Sustainability of Barcelona’s Bicing System

Bike-sharing systems (BSS) are a key component of sustainable urban mobility. However, their performance is strongly influenced by urban topography and socio-economic conditions. This study analyzes Barcelona’s public BSS, Bicing, to examine how altitude and neighborhood income affect bicycle availability, departures, and electric bicycle adoption. The main objective is to determine whether the observed “electric divide” is driven by income or by topographical necessity. The analysis uses 2023 data from 511 Bicing stations and income information from 62 neighborhoods obtained from Open Data Barcelona and the Spanish National Statistics Institute. Three indicators were constructed: bike availability ratio, departures ratio, and electric bicycle ratio. Results show a strong negative correlation between altitude and bike availability (r = −0.71) and a strong positive correlation between altitude and electric bicycle use (r = 0.78). High-altitude stations show lower availability and fewer departures, while electric bicycles dominate uphill trips. Although high-income neighborhoods initially appear to use more electric bicycles, regression results show that income becomes insignificant once altitude is controlled for. Therefore, electric bicycle adoption is driven mainly by physical necessity rather than socio-economic preference.