The Bike-sharing World: First Week of April 2011

Velib'

Europe: The Price of Success

On April 15th, with the approval of the Parisian City government, a revised rate structure for Vélib' begins with many good additions. The current annual subscription of 29€ ($41.50 US) with the first 30 minutes free each time the bike is used remains the same. A new 39€ ($55 US) subscription with 45 free minutes instead of 30 free minutes will induce suburban users to ride longer to work, school, or even further into the city. There is an advantageous subscription for young people under 26 years of age which gives them 45 minutes free instead of the 30 minutes free, but at the same price of 29€ per year subscription. Also there is a new scholastic tariff for students under 26 years of age which affords them a discount of 10€ off the price of a regular annual subscription. A new "formula touristic" allows people holding a credit card without a "chip" (that is most North Americans) to register online or at certain outlets (hotel, tourist office, etc.) in Paris for the 1-day or 7-day pass. The single 1-day pass is now the same price as a single one-way Paris Metro or bus trip 1.70€. This is excellent pricing for making an effective cost connection between bike-sharing and other forms of public transit. The 7-day pass is 8€ ($11.50US). The Vélib' web site will be more user-friendly making it easier to subscribe for all levels, from daily to annuals, online and for users to find locations to activate memberships and download maps. With almost 100,000,000 Vélib' trips since July 15, 2007 this programs success has been priceless.

North America: Bike-sharing wakes up from a long winter's nap

With in the next week, both Montréal' s bIXI and Minneapolis' Nice Ride will be back on the streets after hibernating for the winter. Nice Ride plans on starting its second season on April 11 with eight new stations in north Minneapolis and plans to have 100 stations this summer to include service in downtown St. Paul. They are offering a great way to shake off the cold Minnesota snow with a special limited time $40 annual subscription sale that is $20 off the regular price . bIXI will open its 400 stations in Montréal on April 15. The last few weeks have seen the stations back in places all over their service area. Five new stations are planned for an expansion of the system into Westmount this season. Les Montréaleurs are ready to roll. Capital Bikeshare, however, has beaten winter by rolling throughout the cold months creating scores of winter weather warriors.

images: Bike-sharing Blog, Nice Ride, and bIXI

Russell Meddin bikesharephiladelphia.org

Around the Bike-sharing World this first week of May

From Australia:

Starting this week, as a way to increase awareness of Bike-sharing down under, Common Bike is offering a three week bike-sharing program in Melbourne, Australia. The demonstration is organized by students with the assistance of Ronald Haverman of Bike Sharing Solutions from the Netherlands. As reported in the The Age, the demonstration coincides with the Melbourne Road Minister's plan to ask for a tender offer to be issued for a large bike-sharing program there. Mr. Haverman said that public bike hire would be good for Melbourne continuing, "I think it's good for the very spread-out suburbs, the low-density areas, you need bike stations almost everywhere." Watch a video of the RMIT student run bike-hire demonstration.

From Asia:

Residents and tourists enjoy Green Bangkok Bike in Thailand’s capital. The manual system began last August with 300 bikes and eight service counters and stations. It serves the historic Rattanakosin section of Bangkok and is run by the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration. There is no cost as long as you can provide a valid national ID card or passport.

From North America:

As the images of last summer’s Bike-sharing experiment at the 2008 Republican and Democratic National Conventions in Minneapolis and Denver fade from our memory, so does the realization of bike-sharing systems in both those cities in 2009. Both Minneapolis and Denver had planned to have systems up and running this summer.
In March, Minneapolis announced it was postponing its 1000 bike Nice Ride program from spring/summer 2009 to summer 2010 Bike-sharing Blog March 16, 2009. 
Yesterday, Denver postponed its 600 bike Denver B-cycle debut until spring 2010 as reported in Westword.

BIXI begins in Montréal on Tuesday May 12, 2009!

  

Photos: Commonbike, Bangkok Metropolitan Administration, Nice Ride, B-cycle and BIXI

Russell Meddin  www.bikesharephiladelphia.org

Minneapolis Picks a Winner

As reported in Downtown Journal, Minneapolis has selected a bike-sharing system vendor and hopes to launch its $3 million program in May 2009 with 1,000 bikes at 75 stations. The City of Lakes Nordic Ski Foundation, a non-profit which will manage the program, selected Public Bike System as the system vendor.

According to Downtown Journal, "The bikes proposed for Minneapolis were designed by Stationnement de Montréal, which is the city of Montreal’s parking authority. The agency is launching a bike sharing [sic] program in Montreal next spring and it beat out six other companies to take the Minneapolis job." Stationnement de Montréal spun off Public Bike System into a non-profit to provide its system to other cities.

For more info about the Minneapolis program, visit Public Bicycle Sharing in the Twin Cities.

photo credit: Downtown Journal

You Betcha, Minneapolis & St. Paul

From a press release:

Announcing Twin Cities Bike Share Project

Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak has committed to bring bike sharing to the Twin Cities in 2009. The Proposed Phase 1 public bicycle sharing system will focus on downtown Minneapolis, the main campus of the University of Minnesota, and the Uptown neighborhood. The City has partnered with Metro Transit, the University of Minnesota, bicycle advocacy groups, and local bike shops to develop a proposed system design. That system will complement public transportation by making it possible for students and workers who commute by bus or train to get to class or to their next meeting by the fastest, healthiest, and most fun mode of transportation on downtown streets—the bicycle. For more information and to view a request for proposals, go to twincitiesbikeshare.com.