Way back in September '05 DC announced plans to institute a computerized bicycle rental program. Since then Paris instituted plans to have 14,000 of them up and running by summer (though Paris being Paris, I'm sure they're more avant-garde than these are). Now San Francisco is leapfrogging us too - [thanks to Mike D. for the link].
San Francisco's Municipal Railway has a novel requirement for any company that wants to win its contract to build 1,500 bus shelters -- as many as 20 will have to come with bikes.
The bicycles would be part of San Francisco's effort to become the first major U.S. city with a government-backed bike-sharing program, something that has caught on in Europe.
It's not so novel, that's how DC hopes to get it's bike rental program going. More about this sounds like DC too:
A lot of the details in the Muni contract are sketchy, including how big a bike fleet the winner will have to provide and how riders would go about paying for rentals.
And they have unique problems too
Muni may not be able to move as quickly as it might like, given a court challenge to a Board of Supervisors-approved plan to "shape San Francisco into a world-class bicycling city" by adding bike lanes and amenities wherever possible. A judge ruled in November that the city had rushed the policy into place without state-required environmental studies.
Muni says it will hold off on installing the bike-bus shelters until those studies are completed. But in the meantime, prospective bidders were told this week to submit as many as six designs for the transit shelters, which will replace the crop of 1,120 operated by CBS Outdoor.
1120. It ain't quite 14,000, but as Ferris Bueller said, "I don't even have a piece of s***! I have to envy yours." Pictured is the mayor of Annapolis on a smartbike.
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