KC Bike Share - bike rental (Center, Denver: price, bus, association)

[xenokc]

Coming soon..

Bike Share KC

They'll be doing a demo at the next First Fridays in May in Xroads. Word is the first station will be located in Xroads at 20th/Baltimore near the MAX stop. Hopefully all major MAX stops will get this and elsewhere in City.

More info from the Denver site..
http://www.denverbikesharing.org/membership.ph (broken link)

[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.

[kcmo]

Very cool. This is popular in DC. I would love to see this in every city.

[brewcrew1000]

i think putting one on the plaza, around the grounds of liberty memorial and around union station would be good too. Tourists like those kind of things

[xenokc]

It sounds like anyone can sponsor adding a station. It's up to biz/property owners to sponsor one. Hopefully the City will step up and sponsor a few sites.

I highly doubt Highwoods will for the Plaza - they want total control and will not want anyone to bike out of Plaza. The City could though at the Plaza tennis courts next to the Plaza MAX stop or maybe in Mill Creek Park. Hopefully City Market management will sponsor one too. I'd think Crown Center eventually would once they see it in action. Would be good for Hospital Hill to add one, so that bus riders to CC can get up that hill more quickly/easily. I could see Westport Association sponsoring a few.

The City may as well sponsor most MAX stops and other major bus stops.

[xenokc]

I checked out a demo at First Fridays this weekend. A few are planned for downtown initially. They hope to get the City and ATA on board to fund placing a few near MAX bus stops. Expansion will likely need to come from sponsors. If you work in the city and take bus, might promote this to your place of work to sponsor a station.

There is a smartphone app that shows all stations, how many available, how many slots open. Pretty slick. I'll be getting an annual membership once they can get enough stations going.

[RichMonk]

Originally Posted by xenokc

If you work in the city and take bus, might promote this to your place of work to sponsor a station.

Will definitely do this as my company already subsidizes monthly bus passes. Fifteen dollars a month is a steal.

Is there an official one-sheet out there for this that I could present to HR?

[xenokc]

Found this.. hmm.. kinda pricey to sponsor.

http://www.denverbikesharing.org/sponsorship.php

[RichMonk]

^^The cost seems fair

Given that you get your branding out there on the station, 10 bicycles and in the newsletter, ~1600/mo doesn't seem like a bad deal especially if you then turn around and pump to your employees, potential employees and customers about how awesome your company is for doing this.

Also, as you see ridership increase, your overall employee health should improve, lowering your health care costs.

[xenokc]

I could see larger companies sponsoring but I was hoping smaller companies would get involved, which could be more of a challenge. Hope that several bite.