Get ready for Fox News to start highlighting the Bicycle/Kenyan-UN-Terrorist connection.
(video above features DC, Denver and other cities as well as NYC)
As someone in love with 3rd-generation bike-sharing systems before the large majority of Americans knew anything about them, I’ve been eagerly anticipating and covering NYC’s huge bike-sharing plans for years. This could transform NYC. Bike sharing did so in Paris, and NYC’s program is to be a similar size. Additionally, biking in NYC has been booming under the leadership of Janette Sadik-Khan (Commissioner of the New York City Department of Transportation), see there’s a flame to be fueled with this new program.
A Quinnipiac University poll last October found that 72% of New Yorkers support the program, Transportation Alternatives notes.
Now, if you haven’t heard, the big news of the past week is that Citibank is the primary sponsor of the “Citi Bike” system (the system is not supposed to receive any tax dollars) — Citi Bike website here.
Citibank has signed a $41-million, 5-year contract. Additionally, Mastercard is putting in $6.5 million to operate the payment systems for the bikes.
“We’re getting an entirely new 24/7 transportation network ,” Mayor Michael Bloomberg said. “We are getting an entirely new transportation network without spending any taxpayer money. Who thought that that could be done?”
The system will have 10,000 bikes at 600 stations in Manhattan and Brooklyn.
However, while it was initially stated that the system would start at those numbers, it was made clear in the opening announcement that the system wouldn’t actually reach that scale until 2013. The Upper West and East Sides, Cobble Hill, Park Slope, Prospect Heights and Crown Heights will get bikes and stations next Spring, while the first bikes and 420 stations (about two-thirds of them) will be ready in July around Manhattan and part of Brooklyn.
Across the country, activists with ties to the Tea Party are railing against all sorts of local and state efforts to control sprawl and conserve energy. They brand government action for things like expanding public transportation routes and preserving open space as part of a United Nations-led conspiracy to deny property rights and herd citizens toward cities.
They are showing up at planning meetings to denounce bike lanes on public streets and smart meters on home appliances — efforts they equate to a big-government blueprint against individual rights.
Nice. Capital Bike Share is an excellent solution for tourists to see more of the mall and surrounding area in DC. Otherwise, it is a very long day of walking.
The Tealiban are stark raving bonkers.
Next you’ll have oil companies, slimming companies, and gyms suing bike-sharers for loss of business because a growing group of enlightened people can be healthier and happier without them!
If you’ve seen pictures of the body types at a tea party rally, you can understand why they’d be threatened by the prospect of more bike riders.
Thanks for the mental image, not! 🙂
In the city Munich such a bike sharing system has been operating since the 1990s. First started privately, it has been taken over by the national railway company, Deutsche Bundesbahn, and is successfully running now in many German cities.
This seems to be a spam post.
thanks.
No prob.
London also has had a similar scheme running for a few years now.
Nationally the UK operates a ‘Cycle to Work Scheme’ where companies can buy employees bikes and equipments which is then deducted form the wages in instalments but with a tax break;
http://www.cyclescheme.co.uk/
an advisor to david cameron suggested banning consumer protection agencies on the grounds they were anti business..he wanted to do that ‘to see what would happen’ (and they pay people for these jobs)
encouraging cycling is good thing.it improves health and reduces pollution
http://newyork.citysearch.com/profile/604713762/new_york_ny/nyc_escorts_gorgeous_models.html#profileTab-reviews