Cycle hire and public bike share schemes are now a common sight in towns and cities around the UK. They provide communities with easy access to bikes, which helps the environment and reduces local air pollution, together with congestion reduction and promoting better fitness. For out of towners they are a good means to visit and explore new towns and cities.
Public Bike Share:
Independent cycle hire companies have been with us for years but the best development of cycle hire or bike share is with the large schemes appearing or being developed mainly in larger cities.
An example of this is London’s Santander Cycles. The system has more than 750 docking stations and 11,500 bikes. Currently it costs £2 to access a Santander Cycles bike for 24 hours with the first 30 minutes of each journey being free. Santandar Bikes can be hired using a bank card at the docking station, or by using the official app.
On-street bike sharing first appeared in London in 2010. The UK has around 25,000 bikes now available to share, and 19 million journeys made yearly using these bikes. More and more employers are also offering workplace bikes to the staff for business trips and train operating companies offer bikes from railway stations. Over 1,000 bikes are located at 100 railway stations.
If vandalism and theft can be kept low, PBS schemes have a number of benefits compared to other cycle hire models. They are self-service which gives flexible and convenient drop off at a variety of different points. Unfortunately not all public bike share schemes have worked. The OFO bike scheme in Sheffield was abandoned due to lack of use and vandalism.
Other bike share schemes include Jump, Hourbike, BTN Bikeshare, Cycle Connect, Oxon Bike, Nextbike, Smoove, Donkey Republic, YoBike etc.
A Guide To Hire Bikes And Bike Share
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Read about the Governments plan to encourage cycling and walking at a cost of £2 Billion:
