A bicycle-sharing system, public bicycle system, or bike-share scheme, is a service in which bicycles are made available for shared use to individuals on a very short term basis. Bike share schemes allow people to borrow a bike from point "A" and return it at point "B". Many bike-share systems offer subscriptions that make the first 30-45 minutes of use either free or very inexpensive, encouraging use as transportation. This allows each bike to serve several users per day. In most bike-share cities, casual riding over several hours or days is better served by bicycle rental than by bike-share. For many systems, smartphone mapping apps show nearby stations with available bikes and open docks.
Bike-share began in Europe in 1965 and a viable format emerged in the mid-2000s thanks to the introduction of information technology. As of June 2014, public bikesharing systems were available in 50 countries on five continents, including 712 cities, operating approximately 806,200 bicycles at 37,500 stations. As of May 2011, the Wuhan and Hangzhou Public Bicycle bike-share systems in China were the largest in the world, with around 90,000 and 60,000 bicycles respectively. The Vélib' in Paris bicycle stations, is the largest outside of China. The countries with the most systems are Spain (132), Italy (104), and China (79). As of July 2013, the systems with the higher market penetration are both operating in France, the Parisian Velib' with 1 bike per 97 inhabitants and Vélo'v in Lyon with one bike per 121 residents.
Bicycle-sharing systems can be divided into two general categories: "Community Bike programmes" organised mostly by local community groups or non-profit organisations; and "Smart Bike programmes" implemented by government agencies, sometimes in a public-private partnership. The central concept of these systems is to provide free or affordable access to bicycles for short-distance trips in an urban area as an alternative to motorised public transport or private vehicles, thereby reducing traffic congestion, noise, and air pollution. Bicycle-sharing systems have also been cited as a way to solve the "last mile" problem and connect users to public transit networks.
The reasons people use bike-share vary considerably. Some who would otherwise use their own bicycle have concerns about theft or vandalism, parking or storage, and maintenance requirements. However, with limits on the number of places where bicycles can be rented or returned, the service resembles public transit, and has therefore been criticised as less convenient than a privately owned bicycle used door-to-door. Government-run bicycle-sharing programmes can also prove costly to the public unless subsidised by commercial interests, typically in the form of advertising on stations or the bicycles themselves.
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Types
Although users of such systems generally pay to use vehicles that they themselves do not own, sharing systems differ from traditional for-profit bike rental businesses. The first bike sharing projects were largely initiated by local community organisations, either as charitable projects intended for the disadvantaged, or to promote bicycles as a non-polluting form of transport. In recent years, in an effort to reduce losses from theft and vandalism, many bike-sharing schemes now require a user to provide a monetary deposit or other security, or to become a paid subscriber. Most large-scale urban bike sharing programmes utilise numerous bike check-out stations, and operate much like public transit systems, catering to tourists and visitors as well as local residents. Some bike-sharing systems are completely free like Aarhus in Denmark.
To date, no publicly owned and administered bicycle sharing programme has yet been able to consistently operate as a self-funding enterprise, using only revenues generated from membership subscriptions or user fees and charges. As a consequence, most publicly owned bicycle sharing systems utilise funding from public governmental and/or charitable sources. Bike sharing schemes may be administered by government entities, nonprofit private organisations, or via public-private partnerships.
Many bicycle sharing schemes have been developed by a variety of organisations over the years, all based on one or more of the following systems:
E-bike sharing is becoming more popular. The e-bikes are generally recharged upon parking them at their station. E-bikes extend the range of the bikes and make cities with more difficult topographies more accessible.
In 2009, Chiyu Chen proposed the Hybrid2-system which stores some of the pedal power on a (ultra)capacitor. Similar to vehicle-to-grid systems, the energy is then fed back to the mains electricity grid. The Ohio State University announced plans to integrate electric assist bicycles as part of its bicycle share program launching in 2015.
Long-term checkout
Sometimes known as bike library systems, these bicycles may be lent free of charge, for a refundable deposit, or for a small fee. A bicycle is checked out to one person who will typically keep the bike for several months, and is encouraged or obliged to lock it between uses. A disadvantage of this system is a lower usage frequency, around three uses per day on average as compared to 10 to 15 uses per day typically experienced with other bike-sharing schemes.
Advantages of long-term use include rider familiarity with the bicycle and a mode of travel that is always nearby and instantly ready for use. The bicycle can be checked out like a library book, a liability waiver can be collected at check-out, and the bike can be returned any time. A Library Bike in a person's possession can be chosen for some trips instead of a car, thus lowering car usage. The long-term rental system generally results in fewer repair costs to the scheme administrator, as riders are incentivised to obtain minor maintenance in order to keep the bike in running order during the long rental period. Most of the long-term systems implemented to date are funded solely through charitable donations of second-hand bicycles, using unpaid volunteer labour to maintain, and administer the bicycle fleet. While reducing or eliminating the need for public funding, such a scheme imposes an outer limit to program expansion. The Arcata Bike Library, in California, has loaned over 4000 bicycles using this system.
Partnership with public transport sector
In a national-level programme that combines a typical rental system with several of the above system types, a passenger railway operator or infrastructure manager partners with a national cycling organisation and others to create a system closely connected with public transport. These programmes usually allow for a longer rental time of up to 24 or 48 hours, as well as tourists and round trips. In some German cities the national rail company offers a bike rental service called Call a Bike.
In Guangzhou, China, the privately operated bus rapid transit system includes cycle lanes, and a public bicycle system.
In some cases, like Santander Cycles in London, the bicycle sharing system is owned by the public transport authority itself.
In other cases, like EnCicla in the city of Medellin (Colombia, South America), the Bycicle Sharing System is connected to other modes of transportation, such as the Metro.
Partnership with car park operators
Some car park operators such as Vinci Park in France lend bikes to their customers who park a car.
City CarShare, a San Francisco-based non-profit, received a federal grant in 2012 to integrate electric bicycles within its existing car-sharing fleet. The program is set to launch before the end of 2012 with 45 bikes.
Operations
Many community-run bicycle programmes paint their bicycles in a strong solid colour, such as yellow or white. Painting the bicycles helps to advertise the programme, as well as deter theft (a painted-over bicycle frame is normally less desirable to a buyer). However, theft rates in many bike-sharing programmes remain high, as most shared-use bicycles have value only as basic transport, and may be resold to unsuspecting buyers after being cleaned and repainted. In response, some large-scale bike sharing programmes have designed their own bike using specialised frame designs and other parts to prevent disassembly and resale of stolen parts.
Another advantage of bike-sharing systems is that the smart-cards allow the bicycles to be returned to any station in the system, which facilitates one-way rides to work, education or shopping centres. Thus, one bike may take 10-15 rides a day with different users and can be ridden up to 10,000 km (6,200 mi) a year (citing Lyon, France). Each bike has at least one of these rides with one unique user per day which indicates that in 2014 there were a minimum of at least 294 million unique bike share cyclists worldwide (806,200 bicycles x 365) although common sense indicates that this figure may be a very small estimate of the true number of bike share users.
It was found--in cities like Paris and Copenhagen--that to have a major impact there had to be a high density of available bikes. Copenhagen has 2500 bikes which cannot be used outside the 9 km2 (3.5 sq mi) zone of the city centre (a fine of DKr 1000 applies to any user taking bikes across the canal bridges around the periphery). Since Paris's Vélib' programme operates with an increasing fee past the free first half-hour, users have a strong disincentive to take the bicycles out of the city centre. The distance between stations is only 300-400 metres (1,000-1,300 ft) in inner city areas.
Size
In May 2011, there were around 375 bikesharing systems comprising 236,000 bicycles, and by April 2013 there were around 535 schemes around the world, made of an estimated fleet of 517,000 bicycles. As of June 2014, public bikesharing systems were operating in 50 countries on five continents, including 712 cities, operating approximately 806,200 bicycles at 37,500 stations.
In 2012 the Wuhan and Hangzhou Public Bicycle programs in China are the largest in the world, with around 90,000 and 60,000 bicycles respectively. In Hangzhou there are over 2,400 stations. The Vélib' in Paris, which comprises around 18,000 bicycles and 1,230 bicycle stations, is the largest outside of China. Santander Cycles in London has about 8,000 bikes, and New York City's Citi Bike has about 6,000. As of May 2011, the countries with the most programs are France with 29, Spain (25), Italy (19), and China (19).
As of July 2013, the systems with the higher market penetration are Velib' in Paris with 1 bike per 97 inhabitants, Vélo'v in Lyon with 1 bike per 121 residents, and Hangzou in China with 1 per 145. Barcelona's Bicing has 1 per 270, Montreal's Bixi has 1 per 300, London's Santander Cycles has 1 per 984, and New York City's Citi Bike has 1 per 8,336.
A study published in 2015 in the journal Transportation concludes that bike sharing systems can be grouped into behaviourally similar categories based upon their size. Cluster analysis shows that larger systems display greater behavioural heterogeneity amongst their stations, and smaller systems generally have stations which all behave similarly in terms of their daily utilisation patterns.
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History
Bike-sharing systems have undergone changes which can be categorised into three key phases, or generations. These include the first generation, called white bikes (or free bikes); the second generation of coin-deposit systems; and the third generation, or information technology (IT) based systems. Recent technological and operational improvements are also paving the way for a fourth generation, known as the demand-responsive, multimodal system.
Programs in China
As of 2017, numerous cities across China have one or more competing "lockless" bike-sharing programs. Some cities have experienced massive growth in the number of these bikes causing clogged sidewalks and parking areas. Other problems related to these bikes have prompted action by some municipal governments. Some governments have confiscated bikes. Shanghai has prepared new regulations that will restrict rider ages to 12 and 70. Bikes in service for more than three years in a row must be permanently removed. In March 2017, Shanghai had an estimated 280,000 shared bikes with an expected increase of 220,000 by June.
Beijing
In March 2017, Beijing saw over 200,000 bikes entering service. The bikes are accesible via an app, and cost 1 RMB per hour plus a refundable damage deposit of a few hundred RMB.
Haikou
Starting from around the beginning of 2017, Haikou, the capital of Hainan province, experienced a massive increase in the number of these bikes. Four types of bike are available. Ofo, Mobike, and "Quick to" all use an app and cost 2 RMB per hour. The fourth is the old system that operates without an app and is now virtually obsolete.
Shanghai
The Shanghai Bike Authority had made an estimate that there might be up to half a million shared bikes in the city by June 2017. In March 2017, the government in Shanghai is requesting a temporary ban on the introduction of new shared bikes.
European programs
In 1967, the group Provo painted 50 bicycles white and left them in downtown Amsterdam to be freely used. The bicycles were impounded by authorities, as a city ordinance forbade leaving unlocked bikes in public places.
In 1974 the French city of La Rochelle launched a free bike-sharing programme, Vélos Jaunes (Yellow Bikes), featuring unisex bicycles which were free to take and use. In terms of public usage and acceptance, it is regarded today as one of the first truly successful bike-sharing programmes. The programme continues today, albeit in modified form (rental charges apply after the first two hours, and personal identification is required for all bike rentals).
In 1993, a Green Bike Scheme bike sharing programme was initiated in Cambridge, United Kingdom, using a fleet of some 300 bicycles. The overwhelming majority of the fleet were stolen or missing within a year of the programme's introduction, and the Green Bike Scheme was abandoned.
In an attempt to overcome losses from theft, the next innovation adopted by bike sharing programmes was the use of so-called 'smart technology'. One of the first 'smart bike' programmes was the Grippa(TM) bike storage rack system used in Portsmouth's Bikeabout scheme. The Bikeabout scheme was launched in October 1995 by the University of Portsmouth, UK as part of its Green Transport Plan in an effort to cut car travel by staff and students between campus sites. Funded in part by the EU's ENTRANCE programme, the Bikeabout scheme was a "smart card" fully automated system. For a small fee, users were issued 'smart cards' with magnetic stripes to be swiped through an electronic card reader at a covered 'bike store' kiosk, unlocking the bike from its storage rack. CCTV camera surveillance was installed at all bike stations in an effort to limit vandalism. Upon arriving at the destination station, the smart card was used to open a cycle rack and record the bike's safe return. A charge was automatically registered on the user's card if the bike was returned with damage or if the time exceeded the three-hour maximum. Implemented with an original budget of approximately £200,000, the Portsmouth Bikeabout scheme was never very successful in terms of rider usage, in part due to the limited number of bike kiosks and hours of operation. Seasonal weather restrictions and concerns over unjustified charges for bike damage also imposed barriers to usage. The Bikeabout program was discontinued by the University in 1998 in favour of expanded minibus service; the total costs of the Bikeabout programme were never disclosed.
Following the previous bike-sharing systems, the first next generation bike-sharing system, was introduced in 1991 in Farsø. Even though it was a small-scale scheme, it paved the way for the Copenhagen's ByCyklen programme, which was introduced in 1995 and was the first large-scale urban bike-sharing programme to feature specially designed bicycles with parts which could not be used on other bikes. To obtain a bicycle, riders paid a refundable deposit at one of 110 special locking bike stands, and the riders then had unlimited use of the bike within a specified 'city bike zone'. The fine for not returning a bicycle or leaving the bike-sharing zone exceeded US$150, and was strictly enforced by the police. Originally, the programme's founders hoped to completely finance the programme by selling advertising space on the bicycles, which was placed on the bike's frame and its solid disc-type wheels. This funding source quickly proved to be insufficient, and the city of Copenhagen took over the administration of the programme, funding most of the programme costs through appropriations from city revenues along with contributions from corporate donors. Since the City Bikes programme was free to the user, there is no return on the capital invested by the municipality, and a considerable amount of public funds was constantly used to keep the system in service, to enforce regulations, and to replace missing bikes. In 2013 a new version was expected to be introduced but the municipality of Copenhagen temporarily withdrew its support and there were no free bicycles for most of 2013. Copenhagen municipality changed its mind and a new version was introduced in late 2013.
In September 1997, another Grippa(TM) rack-based public share system was established as a pilot project in Rotterdam, The Netherlands, for the use of commuters, but was terminated the following year due to poorly functioning electronic bike racks.
Helsinki's new city bike system will be put to use in summer 2016. At first there will be 50 city bike stations and 500 bikes serving the inner city area and the system will expand in 2017. The Helsinki city bikes can be recognized from their bright yellow colour. The Helsinki city bike system is procured by HKL. The contract has been made for 10 years for a total value of 12 950 000 euros. The system is supplied by Moventia & Smoove. The bikes and bike stations are supplied by Smoove, and Moventia ensures that the stations are supplied with bikes at even rates and that the bikes remain in good condition. Clear Channel Finland organizes project promotion and partnerships as a Moventia & Smoove subcontractor. Helsinki Cooperative Society Elanto's (HOK-Elanto's) grocery store Alepa is the main cooperation partner of the city bike's and supports the system's implementation.
City bikes will form a part of the overall public transport travel chain in Helsinki. The city bike stations, the availability of bikes and route information will be included in the revised Helsinki Region Transport (HSL) on-line journey planner. The inclusion of city bikes in the public transport routing system is unique by worldwide standards.
In 2001, the not-for-profit organisation BiCyBa released Pink Bicycles into public use in Bratislava, Slovakia. During the next three months all the bikes were stolen or destroyed, and the project was cancelled.
North American programs
United States programs
One of the first community bicycle projects in the United States was started in Portland, Oregon in 1994 by civic and environmental activists Tom O'Keefe, Joe Keating and Steve Gunther. It took the approach of simply releasing a number of bicycles to the streets for unrestricted use. While Portland's Yellow Bike Project was successful in terms of publicity, it proved unsustainable due to theft and vandalism of the bicycles. The Yellow Bike Project was eventually terminated, and replaced with the Create A Commuter (CAC) program, which provides free secondhand bicycles to certain preselected low-income and disadvantaged people who need a bicycle to get to work or attend job training courses, and the 2016 Biketown system. Since 1994, many community projects around the country have attempted programs similar in nature to the Yellow Bike Project, most of which have since been abandoned.
In 1996, a pilot bicycle share project known as the Orange Bike Project was organised in Tucson, Arizona by Bootstraps to Share, a homeless advocacy organisation inspired by the Bikes Not Bombs movement. Using funds from a taxpayer-funded government grant to obtain, recondition, and maintain 30 bicycles, project organisers announced plans to station the bicycles in downtown Tucson and areas adjacent to the University of Arizona. The publicly shared bicycles, painted bright orange by Earl Scheib to identify them, were primarily intended for use by the homeless or those without means of affordable transportation. The initial 30 bicycles placed into service for the Orange Bike Project were all stolen within a few weeks. A total of 80 bicycles were eventually used in the Orange Bike Project, all of which were either stolen or vandalised beyond repair. In one case, an Orange Bike Project bicycle was thrown in front of a freight train, in others, bikes were found with major frame damage consistent with deliberate vandalism. The program was terminated after only five months of operation.
In 1996, Madison, Wisconsin, instituted its Red Bikes Project, a public bike sharing program. These red-painted bicycles were available for the use of the general public, primarily in the student areas of State Street between the University of Wisconsin campus and the Wisconsin State Capitol. Initially, the only rule regarding the use of a Red Bikes Project bicycle was that it was required to remain outside and unlocked, and thus available for any passerby. After a surge in bicycle thefts and vandalism, the program was modified to require a valid credit card and $80 in security deposits for both the bicycle and the now-mandatory bicycle lock. The program is now only available seasonally, from spring (when all snow has melted) to 30 November.
In 2007, Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino and Director of Bicycle Programs, Nicole Freedman, decided to bring bike sharing to the Boston area. In a metro area divided among many municipalities, it would have to span municipal boundaries. The Metropolitan Area Planning Council, the regional planning agency for the metro-Boston region of 101 cities and towns, joined the effort to operate a bike share in the Boston region. Brookline, Cambridge, and Somerville also participated. In 2011, the metropolitan area of Boston launched its 60-station, 600-bike Hubway system, sponsored by the shoe manufacturer New Balance and funded in part by a $3 million grant from the Federal Transit Administration, the contract to operate was awarded to Alta Bicycle Share and the equipment provider was PBSC Urban Solutions. Bicycle-sharing was an immediate success, recording 100,000 station-to-station rides in its first two and a half months. After recording 140,000 trips in four months, Boston's European-style bicycle-sharing system expanded outside of city limits, planting stations across Cambridge, Somerville, and Brookline. Hubway has over 100 stations throughout the Greater Boston area.
In 2007, Bikes Belong, an advocacy group financed by major bicycle manufacturers, worked with city officials, local advocates, and the healthcare firm Humana to bring bikesharing to the Republican and Democratic 2008 conventions. Called "Freewheelin!" the program offered 1,000 bicycles at 12 stations throughout the downtowns of the host cities, Denver and Minneapolis/St. Paul, over the five days of each convention. Bikes Belong's stated goal was to provide a proof-of-concept that large-scale bicycle sharing that was exploding in European cities could work in U.S. cities and provide a valuable addition to the transportation mix. The program was popular among conventioneers, and helped the city of Denver to create a narrative around the "green" attributes of the convention. Both Denver and Minneapolis successfully pursued permanent bikesharing systems, with Denver B-cycle launching on 22 April 2010 as the first of its scale in the U.S., followed by Minneapolis' NiceRide system launching on 10 June 2010.
In Washington, D.C., a privately operated bike-sharing project known as SmartBike DC opened for service in 2008 for the District of Columbia with 10 stations and 120 bikes. Operated by an advertising firm, Clear Channel Outdoor, the system was funded by advertising revenues from bus shelters on public streets, along with revenues from user membership and usage fees. However, the program suffered from perennially low membership and rider usage rates, as well as a limited number of bike rental stations. The program was officially terminated in January 2011. On 20 September 2010, Arlington County, Virginia and the District of Columbia launched the U.S.'s first public-private partnership bikeshare system, Capital Bikeshare, this time with local government and federal funds and operated by Alta Bicycle Share (now Motivate International) with equipment from Montreal-based PBSC Urban Solutions. This system was the largest bike-share service in the United States until May 2013, with over 200 stations and annual ridership of more than two million. The system has expanded into Alexandria, Virginia in 2012 and Montgomery County, Maryland in 2013.
On 22 April 2013, Fort Worth Bike Sharing, a 501(c)3 non-profit organization, launched a B-cycle system consisting of 300 bikes and 30 stations serving Downtown, Near Southside, and Cultural District in Fort Worth, Texas. Fort Worth B-cycle is included in a program called "B-connected" which allows members of over 15 participating B-cycle cities to use their annual memberships for free in other cities.
Citi Bike opened in New York City in May 2013, with 6,000 bicycles and 330 docking stations in Manhattan and Brooklyn. As of June 2013 Citi Bike is the largest bike sharing program in the United States.
On 28 June 2013, Divvy began operating in Chicago, Illinois with 750 bikes at 75 stations by PBSC and has since expanded to over 5,000 bikes at 580 stations as of August 2016.
In August 2013 the Bay Area Bike Share system began operating in the San Francisco Bay Area, California. The system allocated half of its 700 bicycle fleet in San Francisco, and the rest along the Caltrain corridor in Redwood City, Palo Alto, Mountain View and San Jose. In 2015, it was announced that the scheme would expand to 7,000 bikes, over 2016-2017, and would include the East Bay Area communities of Berkeley, Emeryville, and Oakland.
In May 2014, over 40 bicycles were stolen from Baltimore Recreation and Parks department's bike-share program. The bikes were stolen during the city's Ride Around Reservoir program in Druid Hill Park. The bikes were set up to be lent out when a group of youths took them. The cost of replacing the stolen bikes is devastating to the program, which operates completely on donations.
Columbus, Ohio started a CoGo share system in 2013, owned by the City with the hardware provided by PBSC and operated by Motivate. In summer 2015, Zagster launched a 115 bicycle, 15 station system on the Ohio State University campus. The university decided not to integrate with the city's CoGo system.
In 2015, the Green Apple Bikes bike-share system started in Manhattan, Kansas that makes single-speed cruisers available free for 4-hour periods. The program is funded by a consortium of businesses, and bicycles are maintained by volunteers.
On September 21, 2015, the Citi Bike system that started in New York City in 2013 expanded across the Hudson River to Jersey City, New Jersey, on September 21, 2015, with 35 stations and 350 bikes. One membership works for both Citi Bike New York and Citi Bike Jersey City In July 2016 the system experienced its first wave of expansion with 15 new stations and 150 additional bikes. The system now boasts 50 stations with 500 bicycles throughout Jersey City.
In April 2017 NACTO reported that the number of rides by bike share users increased from 320,000 in 2010 to 28,000,000 in 2016.
Canadian programs
Canada's largest bike share system is the BIXI Montréal system. The system was developed by PBSC Urban Solutions. Started in May 2009, it ha s expanded to over 5000 bicycles at 450 stations. The Bixi system was implemented in June 2009 in Ottawa/Gatineau as Capital Bixi, and in May 2011 in Toronto, Ontario as Bixi Toronto.
From 2001 to 2006, BikeShare, operated by the Community Bicycle Network (CBN) in Toronto, was for a time the most popular community bicycle sharing program in North America. BikeShare was intended to overcome some of the theft issues by requiring yearly memberships to sign out any of the 150 refurbished yellow bikes locked up at 16 hubs throughout central Toronto. At its height, over 400 members could sign out a bike from any hub for up to three days. The hubs were located at stores, cafes and community centres where the staff would volunteer their time to sign bikes out and in. Despite steadily increasing administrative, implementation, and maintenance costs, CBN could only charge users around 20 percent of actual costs, as users were unlikely to spend more than $50 per year for a membership. Without sufficient funds in the form of private and government grants, CBN was forced to discontinue BikeShare in 2006.
From 2005 to 2008, a largely unregulated bike sharing program was operated by the Peoples' Pedal organisation in Edmonton, Alberta. The program suffered from high theft and vandalism rates, with 95% of the bikes that had been placed into service stolen or missing by 2008. The program was terminated the same year.
In 2015, Sobi Hamilton began operation in Hamilton, Ontario. It uses Social Bicycles technology, in which all electronics are on the bicycles themselves. With over 100 stations, it is the second-largest system in Canada, and the only major system to not use Bixi technology.
In 2016, Vancouver has installed a bike sharing system, Mobi (bike share), operated by CycleHop Corp. (Smoove system), starting at 1000 bikes in June 2016, 1500 at the end of the summer, 2500 in 2017.
Effects
A study published in the American Journal of Public Health reports observing an increase in cycling and health benefits where bicycle sharing systems are run. In the United States, bikesharing programs have proliferated in recent years, but collision and injury rates for bikesharing are lower than previously computed rates for personal bicycling; one person has been killed while using a bike share scheme.
List of bike sharing systems
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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