A bicycle-sharing system, bike share program, public bicycle scheme, or public bike share (PBS) scheme, is a shared transport service where bicycles are available for shared use by individuals at low cost.
Shared transport or shared mobility is a transportation system where travelers share a vehicle either simultaneously as a group or over time as personal rental, and in the process share the cost of the journey, thus purportedly creating a hybrid between private vehicle use and mass or public transport. It is a transportation strategy that allows users to access transportation services on an as-needed basis. Shared mobility is an umbrella term that encompasses a variety of transportation modes including carsharing, Bicycle-sharing systems, ridesharing companies, carpools, and microtransit.
Nice Ride Minnesota was a seasonally operated nonprofit bicycle sharing system in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota based on the BIXI brand created by Public Bike System Company and first used in Montreal. Launched on June 10, 2010, it served over 10,000 trips in its first month and reached 100,817 rides in the first season of operation. The bicycles in the system are manufactured by Cycles Devinci. They are painted fluorescent green and include a cargo carrier and headlights. They receive daily maintenance, and are redistributed throughout the system via truck.
Capital Bikeshare is a bicycle-sharing system, which serves Washington, D.C., and certain counties of the larger metropolitan area. As of January 2023, it had 700+ stations and more than 5,400 bicycles. The member jurisdictions own most of the equipment and have sourced operations to contractor Motivate International. Opened in September 2010, the system was the largest bike sharing service in the United States until New York City's Citi Bike began operations in May 2013.
Bluebikes, originally Hubway, is a bicycle sharing system in the Boston metropolitan area. As of July 2021, the system had deployed 393 stations with a fleet of over 3,800 bikes in the 10 municipalities it served. Bluebikes is operated by Motivate and uses technology provided by 8D Technologies and PBSC Urban Solutions for equipment. The bike share program officially launched in Boston as Hubway. From 2012 to 2021, neighboring municipalities of Brookline, Cambridge, Somerville, Everett, Newton, Arlington, Chelsea, Watertown, and Salem joined the system. By 2020, total annual members neared 23,000, and as of 2021, 14 million total rides have been taken.
Motivate LLC is a company based in New York City that services bicycle sharing systems and other urban services in North America.
Hangzhou Public Bicycle is a bicycle sharing system serving the city of Hangzhou. As of January 5, 2013, with 66,500 bicycles operating from 2,700 stations, it was the largest bike sharing system in the world, although it has since been overtaken by a number of dockless bike share operators such as Mobike. It is the first bike-sharing system in China. It plans to expand to 175,000 bikes by 2020.
Citi Bike is a privately owned public bicycle sharing system serving the New York City boroughs of the Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan, and Queens, as well as Jersey City and Hoboken, New Jersey. Named after lead sponsor Citigroup, it was operated by Motivate, with former Metropolitan Transportation Authority CEO Jay Walder as chief executive until September 30, 2018, when the company was acquired by Lyft. The system's bikes and stations use technology from Lyft.
Divvy is the bicycle sharing system in the Chicago metropolitan area, currently serving the cities of Chicago and Evanston. The system is owned by the Chicago Department of Transportation and has been operated by Lyft since 2019. As of Sept 2021, Divvy operated 16,500 bicycles and over 800 stations, covering 190 square miles.
Houston BCycle is a bicycle sharing system, owned and operated by Houston Bike Share, a non-profit organization that administers bike sharing for the City of Houston. There are currently over 150 stations located within the city limits, and over 1300 bicycles.
Bay Wheels is a regional public bicycle sharing system in California's San Francisco Bay Area. It is operated by Motivate in a partnership with the Metropolitan Transportation Commission and the Bay Area Air Quality Management District. Bay Wheels is the first regional and large-scale bicycle sharing system deployed in California and on the West Coast of the United States. It was established as Bay Area Bike Share in August 2013. As of January 2018, the Bay Wheels system had over 2,600 bicycles in 262 stations across San Francisco, East Bay and San Jose.
Bike Share Toronto is a bicycle-sharing system in Toronto, Ontario, operated by the Toronto Parking Authority (TPA). The system consists of over 9,000 bicycles and over 700 stations, and covers over 200 square kilometres in 21 of the 25 wards of the city, with plans to expand to the entire city by 2025.
PBSC Urban Solutions, formerly the Public Bike System Company, is an international bicycle-sharing system equipment vendor with their headquarters based in Longueuil, Quebec. The company develops bicycle-sharing systems, equipment, parts, and software, and sells its products to cities in Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom, Spain, Brazil and more. The company has sold about 100,000 bikes and 9,000 stations to 45 cities.
Indiana Pacers Bikeshare, also known as Pacers Bikeshare, is a public bicycle-sharing system in Indianapolis, Indiana, U.S. The service is operated by BCycle, a public bicycle-sharing company owned by Trek Bicycle Corporation. The system launched in April 2014 with 250 bikes and 25 docking stations and has since expanded to 525 bikes and 50 stations. The service is available to users 24/7 year-round. Pacers Bikeshare is owned by and managed as a program of the Indianapolis Cultural Trail.
Biketown, also known as Biketown PDX, is a bicycle-sharing system in Portland, Oregon, that began operation on July 19, 2016. The system is owned by Portland Bureau of Transportation (PBOT) and operated by Lyft, with Nike, Inc. as the title sponsor. At launch, the system had 100 stations and 1,000 bicycles serving the city's central and eastside neighborhoods, with hopes to expand outward.
8D Technologies was a Canadian company that developed bicycle-sharing systems and automated parking management systems. It merged with Motivate in 2017.
Bluegogo was a bicycle-sharing system based in Tianjin, China, founded and owned by Tianjin Luding Technology Co., Ltd. It operated in six Chinese cities, and briefly operated in San Francisco, United States in 2017. The station-less bicycle-sharing system used a mobile app to unlock bicycles. The company went bankrupt in November 2017.
Rekola is a bicycle sharing system in the Czech Republic and Slovakia. It started in Prague in 2013 as a small project of Vít Ježek. As of 2020, it is operating in six Czech cities, Bratislava, the capital of Slovakia and in the Finnish city of Vaasa. The company is operating more than 2,000 bikes, most of which are located in Prague. The daily ridership in 2018 was 4,700 people. The pink bikes of Rekola do not have any docks, which makes the system five times cheaper than traditional dock system. The bikes can be unlocked through an official app. The user unlocks the bikes manually through the code which is given from the app.
Micromobility refers to a range of small, lightweight vehicles, driven by users personally. Micromobility devices include bicycles, e-bikes, electric scooters, electric skateboards, shared bicycle fleets, and electric pedal assisted (pedelec) bicycles.
