Dockless bikes

[Guy Profumo]

Looks like another scheme is about to bite the dust - this time, Oxford - scheme "retreats" to smaller defined areas.

https://www.oxfordmail.co.uk/news/16...ns/?ref=twtrec

[Stumpy Pepys]

To probably no one's disappointment.

[Felicity, I guess so]

Norwich's had gone between my two visits this year. Newcastle's survives, and there are certainly lots of them scattered around. i have pondered riding one to Sunderland so i can use it between campuses (the Sunderland scheme failed years ago- it was a shit one, with clunky locking mechanism that often failed, leading to surcharges)

[sw2borshch]

There were loads of them scattered around outside Newcastle Central Station this morning looking forlorn.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Shame that it seems to be hard to make these schemes work, I thought they were a really good idea.

But what's the point of them in eg Norwich, really? In London, bikes can dovetail really nicely with using train/tube (at least off peak) and make awkward journeys much less awkward. Pick up a hire bike either end of the tube, and you save lots of time over walking/waiting for buses or cycling the whole way. How would that work in Norwich, which anyway is much smaller than London?

[Stumpy Pepys]

They launched them where I live, to general bemusement and annoyance of everyone. The firm went bust and there are still bent orange bicycles cluttering up the place.

With the exception of tourists, pretty much everyone in Munich owns a bike, so I never saw the business logic to begin with. Plus I live in a suburb generally untroubled by sightseers.

[ursus arctos]

Is Die Bahn still running their scheme in the city centre? Those seemed reasonably popular in FFM.

[Stumpy Pepys]

Is Die Bahn still running their scheme in the city centre? Those seemed reasonably popular in FFM.

Yes, I think they're still around. Those things weigh a ton, mind.

[ursus arctos]

I think DB sees that as a feature, not a bug.

[Stumpy Pepys]

I think DB sees that as a feature, not a bug.

Oh I'm sure they do. Throwing one of those in a canal would take some serious effort.

[San Bernardhinault]

I rather like these bikes, but they appear to be getting superceded rapidly in San Diego by the electric scooters which take up less pavement space, and which are easier for the companies to manage - being smaller they can have regular citizens tootle around picking them up and charging them - moving the bikes around requires quite substantial trucks.

[WOM]

The whole 'redistribution' part of these things seems to be their costly weak point. Surely someone with some app-smarts could come up with a way of gamifying / incentivizing the orderly redistribution of the bikes. i.e. 'Save 50% on your rate today when you park the bike at X instead of Y and walk two blocks". Or use geolocation to send a text 'Get a free ride if you move bike from here to here' in the next 2 hours.

[Ginger Yellow]

The whole 'redistribution' part of these things seems to be their costly weak point. Surely someone with some app-smarts could come up with a way of gamifying / incentivizing the orderly redistribution of the bikes.

It doesn't take much smarts. If you don't park it in a dock, you get charged for it.

[WOM]

No, I meant the whole 'guy picks up and ferries bikes around with truck and trailer' redistribution part of it. To SB's point, just above mine.

[ursus arctos]

It is likely due to the sheer size of the Manhattan Citibike area, but I’m not sure how much redistribution gamification could eliminate. There’s a natural migration of bikes from residential areas to business districts that is a basic feature of the system.

If people keep getting killed on the scooters, they aren’t going to last. And they are climatological limits to their being used in the Northeast and Midwest.

[WOM]

Yeah, I'm sure the dynamics change from city to city. In Toronto, it's from the outer urban areas to the downtown core in the morning, and then back again at night. I'm not sure how that impacts their mid-day supply and demand. Or maybe it doesn't.

[caja-dglh]

It is likely due to the sheer size of the Manhattan Citibike area, but I’m not sure how much redistribution gamification could eliminate. There’s a natural migration of bikes from residential areas to business districts that is a basic feature of the system.

If people keep getting killed on the scooters, they aren’t going to last. And they are climatological limits to their being used in the Northeast and Midwest.

There is a gamification element to the Citibike program. They have a "bike angel" point system for putting bikes back where there are shortages. I am not sure of the ins-and-outs but know some friends on twitter seem to be very involved so I guess it cuts your monthly fee.

[WOM]

Yeah, that's the sort of thing I meant. As usual, it already exists. Just like my idea for putting beer in cans.

[caja-dglh]

That is the kind of skill you get from suggesting folk pay you to write spam emails.

Bike Angels

[WOM]

I didn't suggest they pay me. They offered.

[Antepli Ejderha]

In the summer there were a lot being ridden around Deptford by kids. They'd managed to vandalise them so they could ride around on free bikes. Anti social behaviour and crime also went up at the same time.