World Streets on Public Bicycle Systems and City Cycling

The “humble” bicycle has a major role in 21^st century cities, large or small, North or South, rich or poor. Getting city cycling right is a matter of high priority when it comes to local and planetary environmental impacts, solid economics, affordability, fossil fuel and resource savings, public health, equity, democracy and quality of life. For all of those of our cities around the world who have over the last decades bought into the car-plus-speed lifestyle without giving it much thought, getting this transition right is a significant technical, social and political challenge.

Fortunately there is a large and fast expanding base of experience and information on the topic, which should guarantee success for all those who are not too lazy or in too much in a hurry to do their homework properly and lay a successful base for their project.

Janet Larsen, Earth Policy Institute. April 2013

World Streets has been covering the scene world wide since 1998.  So  if you click to https://worldstreets.wordpress.com/tag/city-cycling/ today, you will find more than 140 articles and sources which can help in the move to more and better cycling in your city.

And for Public  Bicycle Systems in particular try https://worldstreets.wordpress.com/category/public-bicycle-system/.

So before you spend one penny of precious taxpayer money for a project you are considering, it would be a pity not to take advantage of the lessons of experience accumulated by so many other cities and groups around the world. — more than 500 cities in 49 countries host bike-sharing programs, with a combined fleet exceeding 500,000 bicycles, (Earth Policy Institute, 2013). Most of these projects are at best adequate, but a few are truly excellent. Look at them, learn from them and let them be your guide.

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The Bike-sharing World Map

To get a more detailed feel for the places and ways in which these PBS systems are coming on-line around the world, take a look at this map by

which shows real-time bike usage by more than 110 cities world-wide — www.bikesharingworld.com. (This map is maintained by Russell Meddin: russellmeddin@bikesharephiladelphia.org & Paul DeMaio: http://www.metrobike.net/contact-us/)

If you go the live map you can scroll for more details.  But here just to give a feel for the situation in Asia, is what you see when you scroll there today..

 Lesson:

You care considering a public bicycle system in your city?  There is no justifiable  reason not to be excellent

Credit, bicycle graphic: Niels Buschke of Santiago Design – http://www.santiagodesign.de/detail/backpid/4/article/i-feel-good-today.html

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Eric Britton
13, rue Pasteur. Courbevoie 92400 France

Bio: Founding editor of World Streets (1988), Eric Britton is an American political scientist, teacher, occasional consultant, and sustainability activist who has observed, learned, taught and worked on missions and advisory assignments on all continents. In the autumn of 2019, he committed his remaining life work to the challenges of aggressively countering climate change and specifically greenhouse gas emissions emanating from the mobility sector. He is not worried about running out of work. Further background and updates: @ericbritton | http://bit.ly/2Ti8LsX | #fekbritton | https://twitter.com/ericbritton | and | https://www.linkedin.com/in/ericbritton/ Contact: climate@newmobility.org) | +336 508 80787 (Also WhatApp) | Skype: newmobility.)

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