Do these things actually do anything? Do they actually stimulate

Certainly Boris bikes and Vélo Bleu are very popular. As a cyclist i use them for general transportation when it's easier to hire one for 30 minutes than carry my own bike down the stairs and have to think about locking it somewhere on arrival. I also know numerous people who have been introduced to cycling through them and now see cycling as a viable method of transport as opposed to a kids game.

>>1064058

They're for shorter rides in a dense city or for tourists in a park.

The main advantage is not having to worry your personal bike getting stolen or having to haul your bike into a building for security.

>>1064058
there were a few stations in my town
for about... 6 months at most
then I guess they figured out that it wasn't a viable business and now they're all gone.

I figure that's true in general, that these programs never succeed long term

>>1064066
yeah, instead you have to worry about your rental bike getting stolen instead, with a 500$+ deposit on it

or be lucky enough that Every place you want to ride to has a NiceRide Station to lockup, cause the rental doesn't come with any normal locking device...

>>1064072
That's why the rental bike systems only work when they have enough stations so that you're never more than a 2 minute walk away from a station.

>>1064058
They are to be hated. They promote driving, because there are certain departure points that constantly need bikes to be shuttled back to them, from the less popular departure points. They promote poor piloting due to novice riders with shit bikes and no enthusiasm that comes from ownership and becoming accustomed to ones own bike. They are used by people who are coffee baristas and in the tech industry when the aren't riding their one wheel e-skateboards. They are to make yuppie city folk feel like they live in Disney land and life is a pixar movie instead of the shit hole that their city is.

>>1064078
>>1064066
these are true, but what is also true is that they are understood to be for the rich, which means that everywhere these are, the streets are full of people perceived to be rich, riding unpredictably and erratically, often blowing lights and going against traffic and going on sidewalks

so they (1) make the rest of us look good, (2) create the perception that cyclist might not be possible to murder with impunity anymore since the cops might actually care this time, (3) create an invisible force field around bike infrastructure since the cagers suddenly give all cyclists 3 to 6 feet clearance, and (4) encourage influential people to lose the feeling that "cyclists" are a distinct, alien class of people, and to start understanding that "cyclist" means "me"

so although they are annoying, I'm fine with them

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>>1064083
>>1064078

t. americans

This kind of infrastructure is great for smallish european cities, especially when they're university cities.
And it's great in parts that are closed off for cagers.

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>>1064087
>bike shares in Europe aren't for the super rich

>>1064088
>paris is the entirety of europe

ok...

>>1064089
>pls let my irrelevant little town matter!

ok...

>>1064090
look lad, it's not the bicycle infrastructure that's responsible for your poverty...

>>1064088

Surely areas with high footfall like offices and retail will have more bike stations than shitty outer residential areas. The reasons why there are offices and retail in the center is because the land value is very high. Rich people don't cycle- they get driven/helicoptered. London's Boris Bikes tend to be used by 2 main groups of people I've seen- Tourists, who are shit at riding, and obviously will only use more central ones, and office workers who usually appear to be late so ride dangerously. Still, probably faster and better than a taxi

>>1064087
Wtf is this poorfag shit?
At least boris bikes have a nexus 3 speed.

>>1064101
To be fair theres nothing quite like riding a boris bike through central london at 5am after a night out. The roads are empty, the light of dawn tinges the horizon and you are still slightly drunk. Pure pottery.

>>1064058
They're pretty popular around here, a lot of students or just random elderly people use them.

I don't know why but I do laugh a bit when I see the trucks driving around moving bikes from station to station.

>>1064083
Why would they be perceied as rich? Do these things have a high price on them?

Here in Buenos Aires (I know, I know), they are free.

It's entirely anecdotal, but here in Nashville the bike shares are usually 50-75% checked out.

That said, they didn't position them as a commuter option - Nashville is way to spread out for that. They put them near parks and tourist stops, so it's targeted at people just wanting to pedal around.

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>>1064233

no it's not, i don't know why he would say that.

I'd rather consider people driving those bikes "poor" as it's the very last mean of transportion i'll consider if i have to move across Paris.
a rich person would take a Uber for sure, or a Taxi if he's in the 1%.

it is known here that those bikes, if very handy, are not economically viable enough for the company (JC Decaux) that operates.

That's why in 2018 they'll be replaced by a competitors that offers better, cheaper, lighter, GPS-tracked bikes that you would be able to leave anywhere you want.

However if i were te mayor of Paris, I'll emphasize on the latest trend : electrical scooters that you book on your smartphone and that you can leave anywhere too
<<<<<<<<<<<<<

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>>1064233
>Why would they be perceied as rich?
Because they are located in rich people neighborhoods, and are meant for the use of rich people

>>1064312
This is true. They were recently introduced in Baltimore, and the vast majority of the stations are in well-off neighborhoods.

they have them here the bikes are heavy as shit and fuck ugly but they're fun to ride around
relax guy

>>1064315
And why would they even bother to put them in the shitty neighborhoods of B-more?

They have them over here, but I have never seen anyone use them.

Personally bus services cover all my mid-distance needs, and for short distances walking is more than fast enough.

>go to london to see friends
>spend 60% of time on boris bikes instead


pleb tier urban downhill on boris bikes is the shit B)

>have multiple city bike cards
>can have a bike gang any minute

it's like some capsule corp shit lads

>>1064482
this

in all the different cities and countries where i've seen them i never saw a single person actually taking one in stead of walking straight past them to the nearest bus stop

>>1064312
>Because they are located in densely built neighborhoods, and are meant for the use of people

Fixed that for you, Comrade.

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Divvy is well setup in my city and I see a lot of their blue bikes around. Solo bikers, couples, group rides, commuters, all kinds. The blue bikes make good noob signage, as noobs often make erratic movements. Bike noobs are usually slow too so they're easy to avoid, it's best to keep distance from their groups anyway. I wouldn't ride their bikes too fast, they handle like crap, weigh like tanks, and equipped with drum brakes... if brakes is the right word to call them...

I was dicking around a parking lot with one and managed to get the rear slide under me giving me some nasty road rash on my knee

>>1064078
I use them all the time in New York/NJ. One is by my house, I ride it to the train station, park it at the train station, then ride it from the New York side to the office. Its faster than the crosstown L train!

Theyr'e great in London. Usually faster than bus or tube and the bike stations are everywhere.

>>1064116
>Pure pottery.

>>1068619
>He doesn't know about the George Lucas pottery meme
It's some damn good pottery anon is firing up.

http://bikefast.org/2017/04/19/belfast-bikes-the-end/

About third of the bikes in Belfast have been vandalised or stolen because people here are dicks.

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They're limited by the fact that you have to construct stations at every departure and destination point. In China bikeshares (pic related) don't have any stations and lock with an electronic lock on the spoke. You can find them and leave them almost everywhere, which is both why they're great and why they'll never happen in NIMBY-infested America.

Makes it easier to arrest Tyrone for stealing bikes.

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>>1064072
>or be lucky enough that Every place you want to ride to has a NiceRide Station to lockup, cause the rental doesn't come with any normal locking device...

Actually the bike share program in Hamilton, Ontario has bikes that can be locked anywhere, since the bikes themselves have the computer that tracks usage, etc.

>>1064058
I hope /n/ doesn't overlook the fact that those bikes are fitted with IGH.
For some /n/iggers that makes these bikes unrideable and basically a menace to (((pure))) cycling.

>>1071171
Wow, I never knew someone could combine the faggiest parts of both /n/ and /pol/.

>>1066453
Densely built poor areas don't get them though.

>>1071183
Thank you. I did my best.

my gf rented one and almost spent enough on the rental to buy some steel 90s rigid mtb off craigslist

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the model in my city is very bulky

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weeeeeeeeee

It's great. It puts a fuckton of incompetent cyclists on the streets so cars are extra careful. Best thing to happen to my city.

>>1064058
I'd rather just buy a cheap used bike then sell it back when I'm done. Bit more of a faff but honestly probably cheaper over more than a day.

Easy bike rental is a good idea in theory though, the lack of cycling infrastructure and amount of people who can barely ride are what make it a nightmare.

>>1064327
>thing is for rich people
>LMAO what? no it's not, why would you say that?
>here is straightforward proof that it's for rich people
>LMAO WHAT? why wouldn't it be for anyone other than rich people?
Why even bother posting?

>>1064116
sounds like bliss desu
have done this in toronto and paris, just perfect

Just visited budapest recently
They got this
Werks fine
http://budapest.hu/sites/english/Lapok/MOL-Bubi-has-been-launched.aspx

Bikes are as usual bulky as fuck.
Its like they are trying to make a shit bike on purpose as theft deterrent.

yeah its good in London but youre paying about £2 every half an hour which goes by instantly

>>1064058
When I lived in Minneapolis I rode them pretty frequently (in fact your picture looks like the Minneapolis ones). They are heavy, but the convenience of only having to go one way (for example, late at night when the buses stop running) is quite nice.

>>1064071
>these programs never succeed long term
Bike sharing programs are quite popular in larger metropolitan areas. Especially when a bus or train service is required to commute some long distance, and there is still a non-negligible distance to work. Many transit systems have limited bike support during peak times due to necessity.

>>1064072
>worry about your rental bike getting stolen instead
Unlikely, as they are horrible bikes, and practically impossible to sell.

yes but obviously not by serious cyclists

we have them at my uni which is really fucking useful

>>1073366
Like a lot of targets of opportunity, it's less about profit and more "because I can". I've seen a few people in London steal Boris Bikes while their riders were inside chicken shops and the like.

>>1072938
With the bullshit they do with the bikes four quid an hours sounds pretty ok to me.

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LONDONfag here.

Boris bikes are my pub bike. The drum brakes suck dick and they weigh a ton but they're comfy and stable even when I'm not...

It's only a shame there's no docks outside of like zone fucking one

>>1073704
They're actually roller brakes but whatever.
Rollerbrakes are absolutely fantastic for normies,but they need to well lubricated with grease or a graphite/mos2 grease througout their entire usefull service life to stay braking good.
Seeing that even shimano doesnt even put sufficient grease in them they wear out fast and loose breaking power quick.

I wonder if the boris bikes have problem with the spokes breaking in the rear wheel,since sg-3r40 hubs have thin af steel flanges that don't support the spoke elbow well.
Here spoke breakage on nexus 3 speeds are rampant.


/autism off

>>1073707

Ah shit, you learn something new every day.

I figured they couldn't fit them with brakes that have any bite because you'd get all the tourist scum smashing their teeth out on the front rack every time they came to a junction...

>>1073366
People steal bikes to ride then ditch in river, not to sell.

>>1064058
these things are cancer.
they are even slower and more unstable than your usual biker in traffic.

>>1064111
Fun fact: my town's university is setting up a campus bike-share using Worksman bikes

These things piss me off. All a city needs to do is install bike racks so that people are able to ride their own bikes. Independent bike shops and hotels could make additional money by offering rental bikes to visitors. That's it - easy, efficient, low cost.
But no, we get these corporate bike rentals that only make a "profit" because the taxpayers are forced to subsidize them.

Anyone got experience with successful share bikes in a hilly city?
Or electric versions?

In my experience in Lyon, France where there's two hills in the city -- all the bikes pool at the bottom of the hills and need to be shuttled back up. The hills are big enough that biking up on a decent bike is OK, but on a crappy share bike pretty much never happens.

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Two Chinese bike sharing companies and one local clone recently came to Singapore, which apparently led to the government cancelling their pilot project to trial a bike-sharing scheme based on fixed docking stations. In line with the city-state's reputation for law-abiding cleanliness, a rash of bike thefts and other abuse (ripping out the locks and repainting them, chucking bikes into canals, that sort of thing) immediately skyrocketed.

We don't really have non-leisure bike lanes so their marketing is largely focused on leisure riding and last-mile commuting. Enthusiasm is pretty high but the GPS is pretty dodgy so actually getting a bike is a huge pain. I've heard that these Chinese companies are essentially bilking VCs and other investors without a plan for sustainable revenue (unlike the long, slow burn of JCDecaux's advertising-based revenue model), so I'm worried that if/when they turn out to be a flash in the pan, the government will conclude that Singaporeans hate cycling and shelve any plans to make our roads bike-friendly.

>>1064058
it's there to alleviate the unspeakable overcrowding in major metropolitan areas and to discourage people from owning (and more importantly: parking) cars.

Of course the end result is that as designer bikes become more and more elaborate and shops begin upping the ante it will divide riders into the haves and have-nots, the have-nots being forced to rent a bike from the local government while being tracked or building their own soon-to-be-outlawed models.

>>1075087
>soon-to-be-outlawed models
you can commute with bikes made before ww2 it's not like you need carbon fiber and shit for that.

>>1064312
>>1064315
niggers would just steal them.
niggers steal anything
niggers

>>1071069
>Pick bike up and walk away with it

What now?

>>1064058
>Do they actually stimulate cycling

You realise those aren't exercise bikes, right? You can detach them.

>>1077114
Chinese authorities recognise that a bike theft has occured and pinpoint units on the field to the GPS location, with instructions to look for a dark skinned man carrying a bike.

>>1077419
>pinpoint units on the field to the GPS location
except chink gps is somehow gives them a location in a middle of a lake 100 miles from where the bike is. the entire area is some high level commies hereditary land so case is closed before it's opened.

>>1072708
aaay glasgow

Isn't a general problem with these that bicycles are usually not available atop of hills?

Are there any companies that fight that by for example rewarding people for taking bikes to those stations?

>>1064058
tons of people use the london boris bikes
fucking awful bikes though and better private bike hire has now popped up around the stations

I used Bixi when I was in Montreal visiting for 3 days and it was awesome. I wish I lived in a city that had a bikeshare