The Bike-sharing World -Second Week of February 2015

North America:
Mexico:
   
   Mexico City:

The largest bike-sharing program in the Americas

For its 5th year anniversary on February 16, Ecobici in Mexico City enters its forth phase expansion with the opening of 171 new stations with an additional 2,300 bikes in the Bonito Juárez section of the City. This makes Ecobici the largest bike-share program in the Americas. Claiming 6,500 bikes in 444 stations this week, Mexico City topples the bike-share North American leaders of New York City, Montréal, and D.C.

Happy Anniversary Ecobici!

images: Ecobici: Mancera

Russell Meddin           bikesharephiladelphia.org

Keep in touch with The Bike-sharing World with The Bike-sharing World Map. It is the premiere resource for information on cities with bike-sharing programs and the complement to The Bike-sharing Blog. Use this easy web address for viewing the map:  

www.bikesharingworld.com.

Follow the Map on Twitter@BikesharingMap

The Bike-sharing World - The Second Week of April 2014

NORTH AMERICA
Canada:

                          Montreal:

The newspapers in Montréal are reporting that Bruno Rodi, a Canadian entrepreneur, will be the new owner of Public Bike Systems Company - Société de Vélo en Libre-Service. According to TVA Nouvelles, the sale of PBSC to Rodi Designs will be formalized on Friday, April 11, 2014. Rodi Designs' website proclaims it is the "sofa specialist for 35 years", which is an entirely different industry than bike-sharing. However, hopefully this will mean more comfortable seats for the bikes.

The bid for the bankrupt PBSC had to be a minimum of $4,000,000 CDN ($3,657,000 USD). We will see if that is a bargain or not.

Update April 24, 2014: An investment firm, REQX Ventures, the investment arm of Related Companies, a real estate developer, and Equinox, a fitness and wellbeing company, has put in a larger bid for PBSC than Rodi. The decision is up to the Bankruptcy Judge to see whose credit card the bIXI kiosk will accept!

Update II April 24, 2014:  After many twist and turns in court the Bankruptcy Judge awards PBSC/Société de Vélos en Libre Service to Rodi Designs. A recap of the day's events can be read in the Montreal Gazette.

Russell Meddin            bikesharephiladelphia.org

Keep in touch with The Bike-sharing World with The Bike-sharing World Map. It is the premiere resource for information on cities with bike-sharing and complement to The Bike-sharing Blog. The easy web address for viewing the map is www.bikesharingworld.com.

Follow the Map on Twitter@BikesharingMap

Weather or Not to Bike-share

Snow-covered London's Barclays Cycle Hire

Is it ever too cold to bike-share? A rather mild North American winter and a pretty rough Central European winter is causing a lot of thought on whether or not to bike-share in winter weather.

As was posted here on December 12, 2011, many bike-sharing systems around the world went into hibernation in December. A notable exception is Canada's Toronto bIXI. It has stayed open and enjoyed the milder winter. Last month, Toronto celebrated the "Coldest Day of the Year" bike ride. It was not very cold and one can see the bike-share bikes are right up front in the photo below.

According to the Gazette, the spokesman for both the Montréal and Toronto bIXI systems, Michel Philibert, indicated that they will watch Toronto's experience, as that city embarks on its first winter with a bIXI service to determine if Montréal should stay open through winter as well. He also had respectable usage numbers for Toronto's system on the winter days that are above freezing. The most northern systems in Asia are the Tianjin Binhai New Area Public Bicycle and the pilots programs in Beijing, China which are open and operating in the winter cold. Although the most northern system in Europe, Trondheim, Norway's Bysykkel is in winter hibernation, the northern German city of Hamburg has StadtRAD rolling. Even in winter with snow or just cold, it seems there can be bike-sharing in the world's upper latitudes.

bikeMi in Milan, Italy this month

Anyone can ride in the winter 

Not only latitude, but altitude also effects the weather. At the foot of the Rocky Mountains at 5,400 ft (1,650 m) above sea level, Colorado's Boulder B-cycle has left two of its stations open for the winter. The locations near the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research will test how the stations, bikes, and users fare in the extreme temperatures. They hope the lessons learned will allow year-round service. 

As for bike-share users, here is a link on tips from ICEBIKE for the winter cyclist. Enjoy riding in the snow, if you have some!

images: Barclays Cycle Hire, The Torontoist, bikeMi on CNTV, Rider from Flickr: comedy_nose

Russell Meddin    bikesharephiladelphia.org

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 for December 2009

BIXI goes into hibernation. Montréal’s harsh winters and the threat of snow remove bike-sharing from the streets of the city for five months. Yesterday was the last day of BIXI in 2009. Their press release stated, "Currently, it is no longer possible to rent a bike, but users can continue to bring their bikes to the various stations still available in the coming days." This video explains the station removal process.

StadtRAD is rolling strong in Hamburg, Germany. This Call a Bike affiliate has 1,000 bikes, but is a bit different because it has 85 stations all with self-serve kiosk. Customers may sign up and rent through the kiosk or the regular Call a Bike telephone method. This hybrid system has been very successful with 223,000 trips having been taken in the first three months.

Handlebar lock on Breezy Rider

The winds of mid-October brought Breezy Riding bike-sharing to Daejon, Korea. This is the second program in South Korea. For a city of 1.5 million, this is a very small system with 200 bikes and 20 stations, but the electronics on these bikes make it very big in interest. The bikes have an electronic locking system on the handle bars. Registration is on-line and the city's value added transit card can be used for payment. A good overview of the system is at Breezy Riding One and Breezy Riding Two. According to the Korea Times, now even Seoul is considering bike-sharing for 2011.

image credits: BIXI, StadtRAD, and Socius

Russell Meddin bikesharephiladelphia.org

Public Health Benefits of Bike-sharing

Recently, the City of Paris gave out medals to the most prolific users of Vélib’ since the system began on July 15, 2007. The “gold medal” was awarded to William, a 40 year old with 3,813 trips. Peter, another 40 year old with 3,774 trips of pedaling, won the silver medal and Thierry, the youngster at 29, snagged the bronze with 3,692 trips on Paris’ grey bikes. To achieve this quantity of trips, the medalists were using Vélib’ at least 5 times each day.

These individuals exemplify the health benefits of bike-sharing and of cycling in general. The men are now in great physical shape. William lost 15 pounds pushing pedals in Paris. (Try to say that ten times fast.

Their accomplishment also points to the healthiness of particular bike-sharing programs. A key factor in a healthy system is the number of usages of bikes per day. Paris, with the help of these guys, has usages 5 to 7 times a day. Lyon averages 7 times a day. Montréal within a few weeks of its launch had 3.5 usages a day. Barcelona tops all with an average of 10 usages per bike per day with spikes of 20 per day on beautiful beach days!

source and image: Velib et Moi - Le Blog

Russell Meddin bikesharephiladelphia.org