The bikesharing thread

[M II A II R II K]

Seattle’s Mayor Murray kills city-run bike-share program

http://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-...rogram-pronto/

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- Seattle’s city-run bike-share program is dead. Officials had planned to roll out a new system with electric bikes to replace Pronto, the city’s troubled bike-share system. But Mayor Ed Murray on Friday said millions of dollars allocated for the new system will be spent instead on bike- and pedestrian-safety projects. And the city no longer will pursue an agreement with Quebec-based Bewegen to put electric bikes on Seattle’s streets, said Benton Strong, a Murray spokesman. Pronto is scheduled to shut down at the end of March, so the announcement means the city will soon have no public system at all.

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[M II A II R II K]

SF threatens legal action against bikeshare company rumored to launch on city streets

http://www.sfexaminer.com/sf-threate...-city-streets/

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- A China-based bikeshare company has lawmakers scrambling to stop it from dumping tens of thousands of bicycles for rent on San Francisco’s streets without proper planning or permits. Now city agencies have threatened legal action against bikeshare company Bluegogo should it expand into San Francisco, the San Francisco Examiner has learned. Officials caught wind of a proposed Bluegogo launch from Chinese-based news reports, among other sources.

- The letter was sent Monday by the heads of the San Francisco Public Works and the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency, the two city agencies with most oversight over bikes and city streets, and warned Bluegogo CEO Gang Li that his company has no legal grounds to expand into San Francisco under its current business model. That warning was sent at the behest of Mayor Ed Lee, sources told the Examiner.

- In particular, the agencies warned Bluegogo that Bay Area Bike Share — run by the Metropolitan Transportation Commission — as well as Motivate and Ford Motors have the exclusive rights to automated site-to-site bike sharing in San Francisco. “You need to ensure that your business operations would not conflict” with that exclusivity right, the agencies wrote.

- If Bluegogo does not comply with the agencies’ requests for permits and modify its business accordingly, “your company may be subject to legal action,” the agencies informed Li. The letter was signed by SFMTA Director of Transportation Ed Reiskin and Director of Public Works Mohammed Nuru. The two directors also asked Bluegogo to provide information on their expansion, and offered help in facilitating a legal launch in San Francisco.

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[mrnyc]

a city council coalition wants the city to fund expanding citibike to the hinterlands:



Citi Bike expansion: Council majority supports public funding option

By Vincent Barone vin.barone@amny.com January 18, 2017



Mayor Bill de Blasio should include public support for a five-borough Citi Bike expansion in his next city budget, City Council members said Wednesday.

But just how much it would cost taxpayers is unclear.

“We know the value that this great service brings to New Yorkers and we want to see it spread further so that more people hop on these bikes to get around,” said Manhattan Councilman Ydanis Rodriguez, chair of the Transportation Committee, in front of City Hall’s steps.

“Unfortunately, without city funding this year’s budget, Citi Bike’s plan for expansion will come to a screeching halt.”

A majority of Council members, 34 in total, support the move to buoy the bike share with taxpayer money in order to bring the service to the likes of the Bronx, Staten Island and other less densely populated areas of the city where Citi Bike might otherwise be difficult to succeed under its current, privately-funded model. Most cities around the country already pump public money into bike share systems.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen 34 of us get together and push for a budget allocation like this,” said Manhattan Councilman Mark Levine, who called the rally a “testament” to the demand for a “reasonable, sensible investment into Citi Bike.”

Levine was one of several supportive lawmakers on hand who have recently seen the service begin to expand into their district with pleasing results. And they were not alone. Seventy-one percent of New Yorkers in a newly published poll said they either “strongly support” (42%) or “somewhat support” (29%) “expanding Citi Bike to more neighborhoods in all five boroughs.”

The poll, which surveyed 880 likely city voters, was conducted by Penn Schoen Berland Research and commissioned by Transportation Alternatives, an advocate for the expansion.

Motivate, Citi Bike’s operators, is currently having conversations with the administration to shape out what a five-borough expansion would look like. Without a plan established, operational costs are difficult to estimate, according to sources familiar with the matter.

Citi Bike would likely have to expand from a planned fleet of about 12,000 bikes by year’s end to about 70,000 or 80,000, according to rough estimates from Polly Trottenberg, the commissioner of the city’s Department of Transportation, at a recent Council hearing. Currently, the installation of about 2,000 bikes requires a capital cost of $12 million, according to Motivate.

“The mayor has said he’d like to make Citi Bike a five-borough system and we’re in active conversations with Motivate on how to continue to strengthen this popular program that the de Blasio administration rescued from the brink of collapse, put on solid footing, and will continue to expand to more neighborhoods this year,” said Austin Finan, a mayoral spokesman, in a statement.


Related
Currently in the midst of its Phase II
Public money for Citi Bike? Not so fast
A City Council proposal would put Citi Bikes
The next Citi Bike expansion could cost taxpayers

http://www.amny.com/transit/citi-bik...ion-1.12978524

[M II A II R II K]

Biketown logs 160,000 trips in months since launch

http://www.oregonlive.com/commuting/..._trips_in.html

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- More than 38,000 people have used Portland's Biketown bike-rental program since it launched in July, taking more than 160,000 trips. Most of the trips were short hops of less than two miles. Biketown and the Portland Bureau of Transportation released the numbers Wednesday, along with results from a user survey that shed some light on how Portlanders are using the program.

- The bureau also said the program, which was created with a $2 million federal grant but receives no ongoing public funds, was having economic benefits. Of tourists using Biketown, 71 percent said they used the system to reach shopping destinations or restaurants, and 69 percent of local users said they were more likely to patronize businesses near a station. However, 3,000 of them signed up for annual memberships.

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[M II A II R II K]

All 119 US bikeshare systems, ranked by size

https://ggwash.org/view/62137/all-11...ranked-by-size

[Cirrus]

^
I made that.

Apparently it's missing a bunch of completely unreported 2-station Zagster systems. Next time I'll just have to use a higher threshold.

[shivtim]

Atlanta's Relay Bike Share is expanding next month with the addition of 21 new stations on the eastside:

[sentinel]

Originally Posted by Cirrus

^
I made that.

Apparently it's missing a bunch of completely unreported 2-station Zagster systems. Next time I'll just have to use a higher threshold.

Lovely map, thanks for creating it!

[M II A II R II K]

Portland Wants to Make Bike Share Work for Disabled Riders

Read More: https://www.citylab.com/transportati...riders/521493/

Portland has one of the largest “smart” bike shares in the U.S., and soon it might also have one of the most diverse, adding hand-powered cycles, easy-balancing trikes, and tandems to its 1,000-strong fleet.

The Portland Bureau of Transportation is developing an adaptive-bike pilot project to supplement its Biketown program, which rents Nike-sponsored bikes with GPS and solar-powered LCD displays. The idea is to serve more riders with disabilities, who have been vocal in lobbying the city for bikes they can comfortably control. --- “These customer needs were quite distinct from how conventional bike-share systems operate,” says Steve Hoyt-McBeth, operations manager at PBOT’s Active Transportation and Safety Division. “People wanted a staffed service to help with questions and fitting, they wanted storage for their mobility device, and they were mostly not interested in biking with auto traffic.”

The city plans to partner with existing, private bike-rental shops located near multi-use trails that don’t allow motor vehicles. It might propagate some form of parking stations for wheelchairs and other mobility apparatuses, so riders can store them safely while they chug around town for a few hours. City staffers have consulted with a number of advocacy organizations, as well as interviewed riders with disabilities. The plan is to launch the pilot in June.

What might the new bikes look like? Hoyt-McBeth says Portland is leaning toward three types, including a “more athletic/aggressive version” of this leaner that helps people with limited or no lower-body movement. It’s also considering delta/trike foot-pedal bikes for those “who can use their legs to propel themselves but may have balance issues,” and tandem bikes (either front-and-back or side-by-side) that “would allow people who can’t comfortably ride on their own to bike.”

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[shivtim]

Atlanta's Relay Bike Share continues to expand - now up to 67 stations after starting with only 10 stations just a year ago. The expansion has branched out from downtown and midtown to neighborhoods such as Virginia Highland, West End, Cabbagetown, Inman Park, and Grant Park. Future expansion will be paid for by money from a bond referendum that recently passed and sponsorship by Georgia's Own Credit Union.

http://relaybikeshare.com/map/

[shivtim]

Also, looks like Carrollton GA, 50 miles west of Atlanta, rolled out a 10 station bike share earlier this year:
http://www.carrolltongreenbelt.com/bike-share/

Ten stations with 50 bikes. There are now 10 Zagster bike share systems in Georgia.

[mrnyc]

citibike is getting ready to roll out to bronx and staten island:



Citi Bike wants to roll out in the Bronx and Staten Island, officials say

By Vincent Barone vin.barone@amny.com May 17, 2017

The Bronx and Staten Island might finally get Citi Bike.

Citi Bike has proposed a five-borough expansion plan that would avoid the use of taxpayer money, according to several officials involved in the negotiations.

Motivate, operator of the bike share company, believes it can add 6,000 new bikes to its network. About 4,000 of those bikes would be distributed to new docks in the Bronx and Staten Island, the remaining two boroughs without Citi Bike service, and other unserved areas.


more:
http://www.amny.com/news/citi-bike-p...and-1.13643839

[mrnyc]

most bike friendly ny neighborhoods:


Lenox Hill, Park Slope dubbed city’s most bike-friendly neighborhoods, report says

By Vincent Barone vin.barone@amny.com May 18, 2017


Lenox Hill and Park Slope top New York City’s most bike-friendly neighborhoods, according to a new analysis from StreetEasy.

The real estate site crunched data weighing access to parks and greenways, density of bike lanes and Citi Bike docks, and apartment listings with bike storage to compile its findings just in time to honor Bike to Work Week, which began Monday and ends Friday.

Battery Park City ranked third, with the Upper East Side and Midtown West rounding out the top five.


more:
http://www.amny.com/news/lenox-hill-...ays-1.13647456

[LMich]

MoGo gets started in Detroit:

Tanya Moutzalias | MLive.com

Detroit's first public bike share system revealed before May launch

By Dana Afana | Detroit Free Press

April 26. 2017

Detroit Bike Share plans to launch the city's first public bicycle rental system in late May.

The system is named "MoGo," in reference to "Motown, motion, movement, mobility, Motor City," with "Go" representing the future of mobility in the city, said Detroit Bike Share founder Lisa Nuszkowski in a Wednesday press conference.

MoGo launched its website Wednesday where people can learn how it works, buy passes and view a station map.

The map is still being finalized, but MoGo will have 43 stations across the city and 430 bikes.

The bikes were assembled at MoGo's 10,000 square-foot warehouse in Detroit's Milwaukee Junction neighborhood, which currently holds 18 seasonal and permanent employees.


Tanya Moutzalias | MLive

[Matthew]

In Winston-Salem, USA Cycling's National Cycling Center has replaced the free bike shares in downtown with one big "pay" bike share. No more P-L-A-Y to unlock free bikes. Now you need the Zagster app and a credit card to unlock bikes and you have to return them to a docking station. They said the free bike shares were a test to see how popular bike sharing is, before introducing a larger and better pay bike share. It's the second pay bike share in North Carolina.

It's officially called United States National Cycling Center Bike Share.



Credit

The bikes have 7 gears for the city's hilly terrain and front and rear lights. Membership is only $30 a year. Docking stations are located around downtown, Salem Lake, the city's new high line bike & walking trail, and the University of North Carolina School of the Arts. From what I've seen, it's very popular.

"It’s incredibly exciting to see the support for bike share among some of Winston-Salem’s most notable businesses and institutions, bringing another transportation option to the community and moving the City towards its goal of getting more people on bikes," said Matthew Burczyk, AICP bicycle and pedestrian coordinator for the City of Winston-Salem.

[LosAngelesSportsFan]

LA's Metro bike system, which has been in downtown LA only, is expanding to Pasadena and San Pedro by next month and to Venice Beach by July.. Many more neighborhoods coming soon after.

Just based on eye test, this month has been the busiest for the program since inception. I Personally love it

[harryc]

Found a great new use for DIVVY - heavy cruiser bikes - they are perfect for walking/running the dog. Pick up a bike on Chicago ave (across from the FLW studio) and ride down the smooth flat (and aptly named) forest ave to Lake st.

[initiald]

Originally Posted by Matthew

It's the second pay bike share in North Carolina.

Raleigh/Wake County are moving at a snail's pace. A couple weeks ago we had a public forum with potential companies that responded to the RFP: Bewegen Technologies, Corps Logistics, Kittelson & Associates, Bantam Strategy Group, Social Bicycles, Transportation Design Group, Bicycle Transit Systems, BCycle.

Not sure on when they will pick a vendor.

[mrnyc]

hellooo cleveland:



UH Bikes expanding as Clevelanders embrace bike sharing, even in winter







BY KAREN FARKAS, CLEVELAND.COM kfarkas@cleveland.com

CLEVELAND, Ohio - Cuyahoga County residents have embraced bike sharing, and UH Bikes is expanding this summer, officials said.

UH Bikes currently has 25 stations and 250 bikes available for public use, primarily in downtown Cleveland and University Circle.

Cuyahoga County's bike share system, sponsored primarily by University Hospitals and the Northeast Ohio Areawide Coordinating Agency, began last fall following a 10-site pre-launch in the summer.

UH Bikes rolls out 250 bikes in Cleveland for official bike sharing launch

As of May 1, 2,626 users have ridden 18,833 miles, burned 753,350 calories, and reduced 16,607 pounds of carbon, officials said.

Of all users, 2,522 are currently active, and a growing number - over 150 - are choosing monthly and annual membership plans.

"We are thrilled about the success of UH Bikes," Cuyahoga County Executive Armond Budish said in a statement. "This partnership allows us to promote a great opportunity for recreation, healthy living, and transportation for our region."

UHBikes remained open throughout the winter and saw committed ridership despite low temperatures, proving that year-round alternative transportation is attractive, officials said.

Since September, new stations in Ohio City and University Circle as well as at Cuyahoga Community College and University Hospitals have been installed, bringing the total number of available stations to 25.



more:

http://www.cleveland.com/cuyahoga-co...in_winter.html

http://www.cleveland.com/metro/index...ng_progra.html

[M II A II R II K]

Bike sharing will open in Pasadena on July 14 in 31 locations

Read More: http://www.sgvtribune.com/general-ne...n-31-locations

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Pasadena is the second city in the county to participate in the bike-share program organized by the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority or Metro. Metro Bike Share began in downtown Los Angeles on July 7, 2016, said Dave Sotero, Metro spokesperson. So far, it has logged 160,000 trips for 380,000 miles while reducing carbon dioxide — a greenhouse gas contributing to climate change — by 362,000 pounds.

- After launching in Pasadena, Metro will open bike-sharing at the Port of Los Angeles on July 31 and in Venice in the late summer, he said. About 370 bicycles will be in Pasadena for the two-year pilot program. Residents will begin seeing installation by mid-June, Sotero said. --- The three-speed Metro bike cruisers will be assigned to bike-rental stations scattered mostly within the east-west Colorado Boulevard corridor: in Old Pasadena, the Rose Bowl, South Lake Avenue, The Paseo/Convention Center, City Hall, Pasadena Playhouse District, Caltech, and Pasadena City College. Only six kiosks will be placed north of the 210 Freeway, including one in the Bungalow Heaven neighborhood, according to Metro. Kiosks will be located at or near the following Gold Line light-rail stations: Allen, Lake, Memorial Park, Del Mar and Fillmore.

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