- "The CitiBike program aimed at putting 10,000 bikes in 600 locations around New York City for commuters to share in the name of environmentalism, health and being hip."
- "CitiBike has put out 6,000 bikes at 325 locations at a cost of $6,833 per bike."
- "For a $95 annual fee bike-share members in Manhattan get all-you-can-use access to the silly looking CitiBike in 45 minute increments."
- For $200 one can find a good used bike from an online list, pay $200... and keep it!
- Worse yet: "In recent months, the program’s operators approached the administrations of Mr. Bloomberg and his successor, Mayor Bill de Blasio, about raising the cost of an annual membership, proposing rates up to $140"
Sample Sources:
Another Liberal Amenity for the Urban Upper Class Courtesy Taxpayers
Citi Bike System Successful, but Wobbly From the Start
Bike Share’s Rough Ride
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1 comment:
Quoted from the articles you list....
Prices can be raised because there's an overwhelming demand.
"the program proved immediately popular. After just one month of operation, the system had over half a million trips, with 50,000 annual members signed up and 1.28 million miles traveled."
Telling will be how many members they retain.
Not all people who want to use a bike want to own a bike.
"It’s a fantastic amenity and a convenience to many thousands of people, from the tourist to the workaday commuter heading from Grand Central to an office."
BikeShare is more than just about getting from point A to point B.
"Perhaps most important, bike share is an integral part of a change in street design that has had a palliative effect on New York City streets, calming them and making them safer for all of us no matter how we travel. It’s an essential part of the urban ecosystem, like bivalves helping to clean a polluted waterway."
Public transit is usually heavily subsidized. Citi Bike was done without any city funds.
"As Citi Bike enters its second year, it does so having passed both the safety test and the popularity test. Now it faces its biggest and most important test, which is whether we’ll forgive it for being unprofitable and poorly managed in the past, and commit to maintaining and improving it for the future — even if, ultimately, it should prove necessary to use city funds. When our auto industry sputtered, it got a bailout. When our banking system, Citibank included, was on the brink of collapse, it got a bailout.
Citi Bike is minuscule compared with the auto industry, or the banking industry or even the rest of the transit system, but its tiny size belies the positive effects it’s already had on the city. If we can find a way to keep bike share running in New York City, then it, too, will have officially become American."
Lucky for us, it won't be a seasonal business in Hawaii.
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