KC Bike Share - bike rental (Kansas City: vs, transportation, stations)

[xenokc]

Four stations have been installed, this one at the River Market 3rd/Grand MAX and Megabus stop...

http://p.twimg.com/AwUUWT0CAAAqDwv.jpg

[xenokc]

All stations installed now. My annual pass card came in the mail. Am ready to give this a shot. Launches July 3rd.

They have enough riders for installing the bikes next Friday (July 3rd) but need help with other things...

Ride in our Maiden B-voyage

Here's the one in Crown Center...

[billiken]

Originally Posted by xenokc

More on Denver's.. they have several dozen stations downtown. Each station has Net access as you can click on each station and tell how many bikes are available and how many slots are open. I wonder what happens if you want to return a bike and all slots are full from bikes that came from other stations?

Denver Bikes | Denver Bike Sharing Program | B-Cycle | bcycle.com

Very exciting this is coming to KC. I'll be using it often.

I just saw this is launching in KC! I just moved to Denver from STL and my company sponsored 50 employee annual memberships. I jumped at the opportunity and it's pretty neat overall, especially since I don't yet own a bike and I live downtown where there are a ton of stations. I figured I'd share my experiences here, being a former Missourian.

In response to your comment, if a station is full, you can go to the station kiosk which gives additional information about other open nearby stations, and an extra few minutes added to get there without incurring additional usage fees.

Also, if there are no bikes left, the kiosk will tell you where nearest available bikes are located.

Downsides: My b-card has never worked, so I typically just use my CC at the kiosk to be identified. On a semi-frequent basis, the machine won't read my CC--this never happens at stores, so I don't know. Also, the station outside my office only has 6 spots--fills up quickly when our company sponsored 50 people!

Very cool idea overall though, especially nice since we don't have storage space for a bike of our own. Wells Fargo has been sponsoring free rides for non-members every Wednesday here as well I see tourists all the time checking the stations out and making positive comments, even if they don't check the bikes out.

[xenokc]

^Thanks for the insight. Looking forward to trying it out. KC is starting with 12 stations and they do have them spaced apart so that most have another nearby but the one in River Market is kind of by itself out there. Could be a problem if full. Hopefully they add another one to W side of RM. I think they really have 20 stations purchased but will wait out to see the usage then figure out best place to put the others. Looks like all stations have at least 9 slots, most 11-13.

Midtowners are already wanting this. Hope it expands by next year.

[xenokc]

So it's now officially launched with bikes in the stations. Can track bike availability on the map by clicking on the station. I've got my annual pass - will be trying after work. Looks like Crown Center is top destination as all slots are full (at this moment).

Kansas City B-cycle | Kansas City Bike Sharing Program | B-cycle | bcycle.com

Android/iPhone Bcycle app also now works.

[xenokc]

A kickstarter-like effort is in the works to expand KC Bcycle to other neighborhoods. They already have $400K+ in sponsors (apparently before this started)...

$100 for a two year membership is a good deal since it's normally $65 annual anyway.

BikeShare KC · Neighbor.ly

[kcmo]

So my son and I used these yesterday. Very nice starter system.

We rented two bikes for a full day (used them for a few hours). Price is great and I don't think most cities have a 30 minutes free deal.

I still think that kc seriously lacks urban recreation infrastructure such as bike lanes, bike paths, levee trails etc, but this is a fantastic addition to kc and should help get more people out and about which should create more demand for more trails etc. (we were pretty alone biking around downtown/crossroads/crown center than we are used to in other large cities).

We enjoyed the bikes. I hope KC can expand them to the plaza, midtown, umkc etc.

One thing though, they are heavy. Downtown KC is hilly and the heavy bikes with only a few gears can make biking around kc on them a bit of a challenge. They were also heavy when lifting them onto max bus bike racks.

While that is to be expected with these types of bikes, kc's topography has more hills than boston, dc etc where we have rented these before. Not sure anything can be done about that, but thought I would mention it. Not really a big deal. A bigger deal is building more places to ride them. Get those bike lanes on Grand built and build trails and connect the downtown parks together (riverfront, penn valley etc).

Nice job getting these installed kc. Now use them

[xenokc]

The bikes are kind of heavy I thought. The low gear is doable though for small hills but not up Penn Valley Park. Bcycle says KC is the hilliest city they are in.

I hope the fund drive now going includes Midtown. Downtown could use a few more sites, especially Consentino's market but Westport/Plaza/UMKC could really use this.

[xenokc]

Great news, there's a tweet on main site that Phase II has been funded for bikeshare to expand to Midtown/Plaza next year (Spring 2013).

Kansas City Bike Sharing News | B-Cycle | bcycle.com

No word on how many stations. There are 12 stations downtown so far. Based on dollar amount, sounds like about same number of stations.

[aragx6]

^Very cool news; thanks for sharing!