SmartBike Program Comes To Penn Quarter! (March 2008)

I’m pretty excited about this…

I’ve lived in Paris for the past year and I have to say, the Velib program here is a huge success. When I look at the pilot program for DC I’m a little worried because it’s on such a small scale. Here in Paris when they launched Velib back in June the first wave included about 100 stations and ever since they have not stopped adding stations.Less than one year later the bikes number in the thousands. They’re now at most 200 meters away from each other and are everywhere in the city. It’s hugely successful and great fun to use, but a big part of the appeal is being able to ride a long distance, to anywhere you want to go in the city of Paris and be sure that you will have a place to drop off your bike or that you will always be able to find a bike and even if the station in front of you doesn’t have any the one down the street surely will.

It’s a shame DC went with Clear Channel instead of the french JCDecaux because from looking at the numbers in Barcelona it’s clear that Clear Channel is a lot slower at implementing this kind of program… Hopefully I’m wrong

given the locations, it seems like this is being pushed as a tourist-related thing to start out with (no offense to those of you who live downtown!)

they really need to push this out into some of the hinterland neighborhoods too, i think. it’ll be interesting to see how this initial roll out does…

I am so happy that this has come to the US.
We used this program while in Paris and Lyon this past fall, and it was a fun way to get around the city.

I hope that it will operate in a similar fashion, with several “stations”, and utilizing one-way drop offs.

As Americans, we need to get out of our cars and get more exercise and contribute to cleaner air.

I hope this catches on and a good idea to start this as the weather warms up. I am glad it is coming to our area.

I hope they do better than they did in Brussels. They need to have enough bikes to make it sustainable.

And no love for Capitol Hill? Eastern Market? Riding a bike from Woodley Park Metro to Adams Morgan makes more sense hoofing it.

I LOVE this! I really look forward to using it. I’m so psyched one of the locations is right around the corner.

One thing that concerns me is that according to the site, it will operate between 6am – 10pm. You can ride for 3 hours without penalty. 3 penalties means you can’t check out another bike (not sure if this is permanent). So in the best case, if you grab a bike at 10 on the dot, you can ride until 1 at the latest. This seems extremely shortsighted. This could be a great option over a taxi after metro is out of service if we speak up about it. If you can please voice your opinions to Clear Channel at SmartBikeDC@clearchannel.com and 1-800-899-4449. What does everyone think about this? Otherwise I’m very excited.

I agree with the station. Did anyone mention that in Paris one-third of daily ridership is between 9pm and 4am when public transport tends to dwindle down.

That’s basically the only time I ever use it. Otherwise why wouldn’t I take the bus or the metro?

Write to smartbike and tell them that they are making a big mistake!!

ONE-THIRD of USERS BETWEEN THE HOURS OF 9PM AND 4AM

One more thing… I’m really into the names Velib’ and Bicing.

Does anyone think DC Smart Bike sounds kinda dumb? :p

What about Union Station as a location????? Lots of tourists there. And I agree with adding Eastern Market. I, for one, always ride my bike there to shop from the Downtown area.

Eastern market and Union station should definitely be added.

It doesn’t appear that this will be available for tourist, as it requires a yearly membership fee.

The bikes in Europe are activated with a machine at each location by using a credit card.

If I recall correctly, the bikes in Europe can be rented a one location and dropped off at another.

PQ anon:
The DC system will be the same, being that you can pick up a bike at one location and drop it at another. I think that the stations should have slightly more docks than bikes though. I’d hate to be at my destination at 1 am and have to ride around the city to find an available station.

Columbia Heights, Mount Pleasant, and Adams Morgan make sense as locations too. These neighborhoods already have a large population of cyclists. Hopefully later phases will be implemented relatively quickly.

pq resident living in france is backed up by this. There is a lack of Velib “parking spaces” near Paris office areas in the morning as well as a scarcity of bikes.

And what ever happened to the fancy D.C. bike dispensers?

#13 you’re correct. I don’t think this system will be available to tourists because when I was a tourist in Barcelona which uses the same Clear Channel system it was only open to people that had gone through the registration process. Unfortunately it’s not as easy as just sticking in your credit card like it is in Paris.

Sucks for the tourists and for the popularity of the system as I’m sure tourists would bring huge ridership numbers.

Again, Let’s hope I’m wrong and Clear Channel has thought of this!

Personally, I hope the system is NOT open to tourists. I think that the limited number of bikes is going to strain the system with residents who will want to use them for quick errands — the intended purpose of the system.

This is a very exciting transportation option. 3 hours is more than enough time to run to Dupont for the farmer’s market, Georgetown for some croissants, and back to PQ for cheese. And if you need the bike for longer — you pay a nominal fee. Sounds fair to me. I wonder if Zipcar is going to see a slight decrease in usage once the bike system is installed.

There are multiple bike rental places for tourists.

I am very proud that this is coming to our neighborhood and DC. Such a progressive idea for our car-loving country. This is the kind of world-class program that we can set us apart from other cities.

I agree with #2 that its a little dissapointing to see the DC pilot program take off on such a small scale compared to Paris. However, I have faith that they’ll expand service once they see how well the service is used.

Look at the Circulator. Started out as just 2 routes. Within a year, they added another route and extended the K street route almost to Glover Park. Then they announced that they’ll be adding two more routes that really service residents, cutting right through Shaw and Adams Morgan. All the sudden we have a viable form of rapid transit that covers a good chunk of the heart of DC.

I’m hoping the same thing happens with Smart Bike!

Now I’m all for increasing biking in the city — BUT not sure this is the way. $39 annual seems reasonable — but what are fees over 3 hours? And I agree with other poster — the true needs is further out vs. downtown, where one can just as easily walk.

And to the person who says why would I bike when I can ride metro? #1 Answer for me is time savings. 35 minutes on the bus vs. 10 minutes on the bike is my commute from Columbia Heights to downtown. And since I OWN my bike (which was only $150 on craigs list) it’s CHEAP! Bike Commuting ROCKS!

More more more. Sorry if I sound greedy. We need these at every metro stop, as well as AdMo, etc. No time reservations; just have enough bikes. I would rock this all the time. Go DC!

Every Metro station!!! That would be awesome, add predictability and convenience. You would not have to memorize yet another map.

Disagree with DC biker. I live downtown. Bikes are the BEST method to get to any place that is three miles or less. I always run my errands by bike.

I’m an experienced biker but avoid biking downtiown like the plague. I’ve almost been hit by cars so many times I just gave up biking in the city. I’m interested to see how slow moving tourists on bikes deal with the awful DC drivers who are not inclined to share the road.

I bike constantly downtown and have been riding and racing for 25 years. It is extremely doable if you know which streets to ride and which to avoid.

Anon 2.. would it be inappropriate to ask you for bike riding tips for us novices?

merci!

Exactly, You’ve been riding and racing for 25 years. People who do know the down town “less likely to die routes” mostly likely have their own bikes and would not be using this service. Where are the bike lanes?

You are correct — I have two bikes. But my visitors don’t and we always rent and ride all over the downtown. One great resource is the WABA website (Washington Area Bicycle Association) — I started using their routes and tips for downtown riding when I first moved here two years ago. I also don’t necessarily use the streets with bike paths as the cars regularly violate that. Rather, I use streets like 5th Street that have lots of stop signs (and mostly slow the cars down a bit). I also remain visible to the cars, let them know my intent to turn or whatever, stay defensive (the way I do when I walk) and even go on a few of the Mass. Ave. sidewalks that don’t have much foot traffic (illegal but the rush hour traffic appreciates it and I don’t mess with the pedestrians). All in all, I’ve been bike commuting and errand running without incident for two years throughout the downtown.