Bikes!
[Image: The New York Bike-Share Project begins! See the poster in giant size]."Imagine walking to a sidewalk corner and finding a public bicycle," the New York Bike-Share Project tells us. "With a cellphone call or swipe of a card, you unlock it from its bike rack and ride it across town. Once at your destination, you steer to the closest bike rack and, with one more call or card swipe, return the bike to the public network. You pay less than $.50 for the trip, and the bike is once again available for the taking."
The idea is called "bike-sharing" – and it "already exists in cities across Europe, with Paris alone currently installing over 10,000 bikes at 750 stations." As such, bike-sharing has been "revolutionizing transportation networks" as well as "greening the urban fabric."
But will it work in New York City...?- The New York Bike-Share Project consists of three parts: The Experiment: Twenty bicycles will be available for free 30-minute rentals between Storefront for Art and Architecture (97 Kenmare Street) and a roving, remote location. The Exhibition: A review of eight successful bike-share programs in European cities will be on view at Storefront. The Charette: The Forum for Urban Design will facilitate a public imagining of a future bike-share program in New York. Design and transportation experts will make public presentations on July 9 and 10 at 6pm. Final charette results will be published on nybikeshare.org and presented to the public on July 11 at 6pm.
(Note: The Forum for Urban Design also publishes the Urban Design Review, and the Storefront for Art and Architecture were the hosts of Postopolis!).
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13 Comments:
If I lived in NYC and had a 24 inch pair of bolt cutters, any bicycle would be a "public bicycle."
Portland had a free public bike project for a while in the mid-90's (you can google for Yellow Bike Project and find a number of pages about it). IIRC, it was modeled on another city's program before that.
There was an experiment like this in holland back in the seventies: white bikes were on offer for people to use them and abandon them when they had reached their destination. But too many people sole the bikes and painted them (although some kids ALSO took normal bikes and "liberated" them by painting them white - my former boss met his future wife that way, she caught him painting her bike white).
This looks more elaborate and might just work.
Interested you link to Toynbee.
I have a blog on Toynbee (and have a link to your blog -- which I am about to do a post on). This is NOT to ask for an exchange!
http://davidderrick.wordpress.com/
David Derrick
This idea is also being implemented in South Korea at the moment...but with SMART cars instead of bikes.
Currently under construction, New Songdo city is being built from scratch and will have all infrastructure built in, such as internet, transport and services.
Expected completion in 2010.
Details here:
http://www.songdo.com/default.aspx
I think the city will be amazing.
Here in italy it would never, ever work... That's sad to say, but our civic sense is that low.
M
It would be cool to add a GPS to each bike and then track them over time using something like http://gpsvisualizer.com/
:)
As you mentionned, some European cities implemented this scheme successfully (Even more Meditarean ones: Lyon: http://www.velorution.biz/?p=892) Unfortunately it's financed by J.C.Decaux who isn't doing it for phylanthropic or ecological reasons...
But all the best for trying to make it happen and I'm curious to see how New York will react to it.
Writing out of Ann Arbor, Michigan. I have been riding my bike anywhere and everywhere throughout whatever urban wonderlands I have found myself. A2 is a blast by the way and seems to have a vibrant bike culture. Watch out for vehicles though wherever this great idea may take off, I found myself eating windshield at the last town I lived in. A city truck no less. Ride safe...but ride nonetheless!
This service is already available in Barcelona organized by Public Authority. It's becoming a big success. It seems that some bike rental companies want to start a lawsuit against the Major for disloyal concurrence.
They tried this in Spokane, Washington with the "lilac bikes".
All were stolen.
The next spring, nearly half of them were found at the bottom of the Spokane River.
So, good luck, NYC!
All the more reason to use a GPS tracker...
This was just started in Paris and seems to be taking quite well. I did not have a Parisian credit card to get one for my self whilst I was there though so i could not try one out. I would love this here in Chicago!
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