[Image via SmartBike DC]
This past Sunday, The New York Times ran an article about bike sharing coming to DC (as did The Washington Post and The Associated Press.) I find it interesting that I had, not 4 days sooner, blogged about the Parisian and Viennese bicycle sharing programs.
The program, named SmartBike DC, is only currently going to be implemented in the North West of the District; the article mentions that there will only be 120 bikes and 10 stations in the system, but that it is hoped that it will grow to over a 1000. I applaud this move by the district and its partnering with clear channel which has made this a possibility. More government services should look to this as a test of private sponsorship as an alternative to privatization. In addition, I hope more bikes and racks are swiftly forthcoming, the more capacity this system has the greater the ridership and impact it will have.
Unfortunately, I worry that the system is not in place for those who could use it the most, the residents of NE and SE, many of whom are WAMTA bound and to whom $40 a year unlimited use rental fee will be much more reasonable than the $40 weekly Metro passes or the $11 weekly ($44 monthly) unlimited bus passes. In addition, besides the Shaw neighborhood and the Reeves Center (which is close but not in the heart of the columbia heights gentrification), none of the other 8 bike locations are in non-gentrified non-majority white neighborhoods. Furthermore, of the few images of people that are present on the website, none seem to represent people of color. To me this seems to reek of a further separation of transportation methods amongst the district residents. White middle and upper class people in NW will now take cabs, the metro, and bikes, while the working poor in NE and SE will be forced to rely on the same failing bus system that they have in the past. This makes me wonder if this whole endeavor is in some way an attempt to kowtow to environmental pressure from the middle and upper classes and not a means of democratizing transportation.
GREAT ENTRY. So good in fact, that i took the time to sign up to word press to comment! I was commenting on Tyler’s LJ about this last week, and really bitching about the fact that the bikes are located a places where there are already a multitude of transit choices! I couldn’t have said it better than you did. I live in Cap Hill near H Street, and was shocked than even Union Station is being left out. Most of the bike locations are within walking distance of each other. Who is going to actually use them?
I’d argue that U Street is pretty well gentrified already with an expensive cake shop (6-7 bucks a slice), Starbucks, and a new shop when you can pay 2 dollars EACH for bite sized chocolates! My bf and I went yesterday, and I was shocked that 5 little chocolates cost over 10 bucks!
PS: I had NO IDEA that weekly bus passes existed. I don’t thnk many peopel know about this option. I could have saved a bit of money since moving to NE in October. Although, come to think of it I rarely take the bus more than 9 times a week, especially in the nicer weather. So far this week, I’ve taken 2 cabs and walked to the metro once, out of 5 trips so far. And I might walk home from union station again tonight.
The WMATA website has a bunch of hidden information, if you are persistent enough to find it. Here is a link to the page listing all of the different passes and fare cards.
The thing that bugs me the most about the half-cocked attempt at a bicycle system is that it seems to be aimed at the government employees, who are already well served by mass transit, instead of attempting to use it as a way of covering the large areas of the city not currently served by metro. Also, because the racks are so few and far between if a rack is full, a rider may have to travel halfway across the city to return their vehicle.