Does Bike Share Make Sense?

[@rolandxb3581]

Dutch person here. I just want to say how refreshing and enjoyable your videos are. No ego, no snarky comments about other places, no hot takes, always clear, nuanced, positive, and well thought-through. You really do seem to be lovely people! With regards to the topic, at the moment, our government is failing at some pretty essential functions. Local and national government is often understaffed and overburdened. A government can only do so much and ours desperately needs to fix numerous far more pressing issues. I want it to fully focus on improving essential public services. As you say, it's on the bottom of the priority list. Could be nice to have, but not a necessity. It would also have a hefty up-front cost to roll this out across the nation. Bike theft is a big issue in big cities like Amsterdam, less so in other places. Ive had like one bike stolen in my entire life? One fun note, many Dutch people can perform basic maintenance on a bike by themselves, especially fixing flat tires and putting the chain back on the gears.

[@Alina_Schmidt]

I get the point about less common bike theft (also never was a problem where I lived) and maintainance abilities (because of course). What I don‘t get is the point about the government. They would maybe have to make a law to make bike share possible. But after that it wouldn‘t be their buisiness at all. Bike share can be provided by a privare company. (Ovfiets is also not owned by the government or is it?) Where I live it‘s provided by the local pubic transit provider. Technically that‘s under municipal control, but actually it is still a company that works for the municipality. The local politicians themselves don‘t have to run it. The combination with the public transit is great because your annual or monthly public transit pass also allows the use of bike share. So it‘s also convenient for users who don‘t use the share that often because they often take their own bike.

[@rolandxb3581]

@@Alina_Schmidt There have been private attempts at setting up viable bike-share services and they failed due to lack of demand. So realistically, the government would have to do it, or they would have to provide funding to a for-profit business that runs it, or set up a new quasi-governmental organization to manage the system. Neither option is great and there's no room in the budget realistically for non-essential services. About OV-fiets, it is not a commercial business, it's run by the state-owned Dutch railways. Oh, what I forgot to mention is that if I remember correctly, there were some serious issues with bikeshare bikes getting stolen at an alarming rate in cities like Amsterdam. So we can't assume it would actually be cheap to run.

[@OntarioTrafficMan]

@@rolandxb3581 The problem with the feeble Dutch attempts at bikeshare like Mobike is that bikeshare systems need to go big or go home for the system to be attractive. There need to be places throughout the city where people can count on always finding a bike, those places need to be extremely numerous (every few hundred metres) and cover a wide area, and the bike maintenance needs to be very proactive. From what I saw of Mobike, they didn't achieve any of these requirements, which explains why they failed while systems in Canada like Toronto, Hamilton and Montréal have become very popular. And don't forget that even in Canadian cities, an extremely high percentage of people own a bicycle, even if they don't use it very often.

[@Paul_C]

There are a few possibilities even in the Netherlands. The problem is not so much the availability, it is the way we use the bicycle. You simply do not have the infrastructure, and seriously, as I type this 'why do you show an incomplete sabby bicycle without fenders but with a rack'?

[@LostMekkaSoft]

> many Dutch people can perform basic maintenance on a bike by themselves, especially fixing flat tires and putting the chain back on the gears but thats only for their own bikes, not for OV-fiets bikes, right? although a community where everyone is doing their part for maintenance on the shared bike pool sounds truly wonderful to me 😻

[@timdeleeuw18]

A big problem which made bike share companies go away from the Netherlands, were complaints about abadoned rental bike in public space. So a lot of city governments forbidded them. Also, space is a problem you might underestimate. We have very compact city centres which are full of parked bikes. Having racks exclusively for rental bikes, would feel like an unfair claim of public space which could be used for all bikes. Of course, we also can create more underground parking spaces, but that's of course very costly.

[@Gekiganger03]

Wouldn't dedicated bike share racks reduce the number of parked bikes? If only one person is using a bike, it's going to spend most of its time sitting parked in one place. With a bike share, the bikes will all be used by many people, so there should be less need for space, right?

[@amberflokstra88]

@@Gekiganger03no it wouldn’t. Because the trips people here do on a bike or even would like to do on a bike would be more easily done with the bikes already owned by them. Also, looking at the racks for the share bikes in the video, that takes up the same amount of space as 3 times the number of self owned bikes. For each share bike you need the parking space of 3 regular bikes. That means only a third of the normal amount of people can come by bike. Will you break the news to the Dutch? That the number of people in bikes need to be cut down to a third?

[@wernerrietveld]

@@amberflokstra88 That is a problem with docks. However plenty of systems work without docks, like Donkey Republic or the scooters (not the electric kickbike, but the moped type) from Felix and Check. Although I have to admit that the users of these services seem to be a bit careless in where to park these sometimes.

[@aquariamoon2451]

@@wernerrietveld Which then cycles (pun not intended lol) back to the problem timdeleeuw pointed out where bike rentals get banned because of that exact reason.

[@madsbahrt8222]

​@@aquariamoon2451 In Copenhagen and Odense in Denmark you can only leave your Donkey republic bikes in designated geofenced areas. These coincide with a public parking rack. There are limits to how many bikesharing bikes can be left in a single zone, ensuring space for non-sharing/regular bikes. The municipal administration have the legal power to regulate these companies and since this regulation was introduced the issues with electric kickscooters and private company bikesharing bikes being left in problematic locations seems to have been mostly solved. I think this is a good solution: - No public space used for bike share dedicated racks, the existing infrastructure is used for both bikeshare bikes and private bikes. - Given that the bikes are just regular bikes and the "intelligence" is only in the app on your phone and the bluetooth lock on the bike, I think these bikes must be significantly cheaper. AFAIK Donkey republic is operating without public subsidies in Copenhagen, while being still affordable. I use these bikes on a daily basis as a part of my private bike-train-bikeshare bike commute. I am usually satisfied with the amount of bikes close to where I need them, with the state of the bikes and with the places I can leave them again. The geofenced areas are by necessity of GPS precision slightly larger that the actual bike rack, so occasionally a bike is not left in a rack, but close by, but it is not a big issue.

[@infj4w511]

I use my bike during the week for my shopping + work bag, on the weekend for a large bag and various objects and occasionally for moving my French horn. That's why I have a removable bicycle bag, and a different rack at the front and back. My mother has always had a bicycle with a detachable bicycle trailer, child seats and a rack. That bike was heavy and sturdy. She also had a light bicycle with little luggage space if she did not have to transport children and no weekly shopping for a family of seven. If you use your bicycle a lot, it is nice to buy your own bicycle with your own budget, adapt it to your own wishes and maintain it for your own use. For example: as a teenager I had a very good and sturdy bicycle that cost a few hundred, but never had to be repaired, despite my shameless use of it. Now I have a cheap bike, because I leave my bike at the train station of a big city every weekend, I don't use an extra lock and I don't want to spend a euro every week for secured and covered parking. Furthermore, bicycle maintenance is very cheap and simple (as long as you don't keep putting off purchasing a set of wrenches for the first time in your life). I would definitely be able to rent bikes. And I might find myself in a scenario some day when I rent an electric cargo bike (as I don't have a car) or a folding bike if I were visiting the countryside by transit, but I can't really imagine any other scenarios where I'd rent one.

[@oldbrokenhands]

We tried that here in Dallas, but the problem here was corporate greed and a lack of any real plan by the city.

[@ifer1280]

The flexibility of bike share use is countered by the fact that those bike share bikes need to be absolutely everywhere to be of any use. We don't have the bike parking space for that in the places you might want these, so you'll have to walk longer to get one. And for the price of a second hand bike per year, I'm just not convinced it's worth the money when I can go from my departure point (my house or a train station) directly to my destination with my own bike or an OV-fiets.

[@danielyeshe]

The one problem I have with bike share over owning one is that you might get to your local bike station and find there isn't one there.

[@tns5044]

We have several bike share systems in The Netherlands, here in Utrecht it's Tier.

[@JuanesYEG]

BIXI was super useful (and fun) when I visited Montreal, so I decided to get the year pass for the Santander Cycles now that I'm in London (UK). People are really surprised when a tell them I paid £90 for unlimited rides (student discount, £120 normally) since all other forms of commuting here are far more expensive. For my commute, it's far cheaper than any other form of transport (other than walking) and faster too (yes, even when compared to the tube, bus, and car). I could buy my own bike, sure, but I don't have much space for one and the peace of mind of knowing I'll never have my bike stolen is so so so wonderful.

[@SaveMoneySavethePlanet]

It’s always surprising to me how many people don’t investigate the thing on the sidewalk that they walk past every day. When I had a lengthy work commitment in Pittsburgh I grabbed their 500 minute bike share pass for $20. Told a couple people in the office what I was using and they all said, “wait, THAT’S how cheap those things are?!?”

[@Imthefake]

I pay 12€/ year for bikemi in Milan (normal price is 36 which is still super cheap)

[@charles-edouardmorel3173]

I get the Bixi season pass in Montreal, April through November costs 90$, about as much as the cost of a monthly public transit pass. Since I've started getting that pass 2 years ago, I've only gotten the monthly transit pass december-march. That may change this year, since Bixi will now be year-long starting next month!

[@liamness]

The scheme in London is loss making, so that probably explains why it's so cheap. Apparently the subsidy per trip is higher than any other mode of public transport (buses are next). Still I think it's worth it as it offers an easy way for people to try out cycling. The OV-Fiets scheme exists for different reasons, it's mainly to offer an alternative to people storing a second bike permanently in the city / town where they work (which is partly why they need those massive bike parking garages).

[@liamness]

Oh and I think it's worth looking into Swapfiets as an alternative to the TfL bikes. Likely a little more expensive over a whole year, but then again you're not restricted to traveling to / from areas with docks. And storage / theft is less of a concern than with a bike you own, as they are not very attractive to thieves and if it does get stolen, you only pay a fixed fee to get a replacement bike.

[@ArjenHaayman]

I'm Dutch and have used bikeshare systems in places like Berlin, Salt Lake City, Stockholm and especially Łódź (Poland), since I was there the most. What really hit home was the freedom it gave: not having to remember where you parked your bike and being constantly aware that you have to get back to that location to pick it up again. Such liberation!

[@zahawolfe]

I actually do enjoy bikeshares sometimes, especially in Helsinki, but after living in Amsterdam (with a swapfiets) it makes sense for them to have their own bikes. The difference is that EVERYONE uses bikes, not just some people. The fleet and storage for bikeshares would be insane and I'd be frequently concerned about not enough capacity in high traffic areas. That being said, it would be useful to some people at some times, especially for visitors

[@Ssarevok]

Dutchman here and I was thinking the same thing: if this were to become popular and the company offering wants to assure availability of both bikes AND empty docking spots for drop-off, the amount of bikes and docking points needed would be insane. A medium sized city would need maybe 10.000 bikes seeded throughout the city and 10.000 or more EMTPY docking points for those people to park them, plus probaby a few thousand parked bikes for people arriving early before the influx of the main rush hour. (big cities like Amsterdam would need exponentially more bikes and spots probably) You'd also need a few thousand docking points at every high school once students decide that your bike-share scheme is a good idea. And those thousands would also need to be seeded near their houses to make it useful, so you'd hundreds of seed points with maybe a dozen bikes each (plus empty spots for anyone arriving with an extra bike). A counterpoint to how awesome it is even in non-Dutch places: when my brother and sister visited Berlin, they reported that the bike share was great, but once they wanted to park, the couldn't find an empty docking station where they wanted to go and had to park 3 docking spots further along. This made them late for dinner, which in their case, was a minor annoyance. But if you want it to commute, I don't thing managers or teachers would like it if their people keep coming in late because they couldn't find a place to park. My point is: if you want such a scheme to stay popular once it actually gets popular, you need to ensure availability, otherwise you'll become knows as the company with that "nice idea, but there's never any bikes because they're all in use (or people can't park because all docking spots are in use)". Like someone else mentioned in another comment: there have been attempts by companies with bike and moped sharing without fixed docking places, where you had to leave it within x meters of a GPS coordinate, but cities ended up with bikes and scooters blocking side-walks (nuisance to able-bodied person, no fun if you're in a wheel-chair or using a walker). I'm sure I thought of more stuff while watching the video, but can't remember all of them. :) Edit: thought of two more points: if you're trying to start this up, you'd logically want any docking spot in a convenient spot for bike parking. That means, you probably have to convince a city to not only remove a current bike parking spot, but also get a local ordinance to prohibit parking any other bikes at your docking points, otherwise they'll buried under privately-owned bikes. Also, once you've somehow managed to scale up to the numbers mentioned above, you probably want to occasionally shuttle some bikes back and forth to maintain availability and prevent overcrowding. For cities like Amsterdam, that would probably mean a fleet of trucks to maintain just the city... Edit2: As for OV-fiets: the only reason that gets around all the problems is because they only operate from the bigger stations, which lets someone keep and eye on them so it doesn't become a mess with the parking. Also, by mandating return to the same spot, you know there will always be parking spots for returning bikes. Like you mentioned: the downside is indeed that you're kinda forced to may daily flat rates, because people will go to where they want to go, do their thing there (work, shop, party, whatever) and then ride back to the station at the end of the day. The €5,00 rate is pretty comparable to a bus trip of the same distance, but with the benefit of not having to walk from the bus station.

[@JezzN]

Exactly, OV-fiets have these charges for returning to other locations for a reason, otherwise it would be totally unmanageable.

[@sinatrabone]

Good point!

[@DanDanDoe]

You also notice with the OV-fiets that if there’s some kind of event in the city the bikes might be all gone. When I was a rower in uni it wasn’t uncommon to arrive at the OV-fiets depot together with dozens of other rowers and coaches looking to rent a bike for the day. It’s difficult to keep up with such spikes in usage, even when we’re just talking about a few hundred people extra.

[@woutvanostaden1299]

This is why I use a unicycle in combination with public transportation here in the Netherlands. Since you can bring them into stores or any OV form (without the bicycle fee) have the same convenience as a folding bike, but without the folding hassle. More people should give it a try and it supports local circus clubs and circus festivals since not everyone will be able to learn it without. 😢😮😅 + it's a fun and currently rare sight to see someone like me riding in the rain on a unicycle, an umbrella and their arms full of groceries.😊

[@Frostbiker]

I had never thought of the similarity of a unicycle and a folding bike for commuting. And I bet it's easier to carry!

[@MathieuTechMoto]

i've never riden an Unicycle, but i've done a lot on an Electric Unicycle as they are tolerated in Canada

[@woutvanostaden1299]

@@Frostbiker Totally 1 hand on the saddle, like a slightly "heavy" office suitcase. The last part has also been very helpful. With how difficult it is to ride a bicycle in the rain with an umbrella, whereas on a unicycle you are handsfree by default. Which is very useful when it's raining and you have a talent to even get lost on a straight road. (Sometimes even with gps)

[@TheMaevian]

But in combination with public transportation you could also use OV fiets. It’s only not available for tourists

[@sIosha]

Sounds dangerous ngl

[@weetikissa]

I live in the Netherlands and would absolutely see the point in having bike share if I ever used public transportation inside of my city. But I never do. I’m always going everywhere by bike. If I do take transit, it’s going to be a train, in which case there’s always an OV-fiets waiting for me, and I will be taking a train back later that day.

[@TheTroyc1982]

yeah but now you have to take the OV-fiets where ever you go and what happens if it stolen? let say you want to go somewhere else that's too far to bike, what do you do with the OV-fiets then?

[@sagichdirdochnicht4653]

I'm not in the Netherlands but Germany, but the same is true for me. I will walk or cycle. I don't use public transit often, as I find it inconvenient compared to hop on a bike and just go. For the most part because I hate waiting. And overfilled trams. Well, my city thined out the plans during corona. Then they kinda stuck with it. And now they are further thinning out plans, making it the most inconvenient form of transport at the moment , even tough the network is actually good. Had to go to the other end of the city yesterday and had to take transit because i'm injured (a car hit me....) and what could have been a relaxed 15 minute cycle turned out to be 50 Minutes. One way. We have bike sharing... And for the life of me, I can't figure out a usecase for me. Either my destination is

[@weetikissa]

@@TheTroyc1982 Let's be real, nobody's stealing an OV-fiets. No one will buy it from the thief. What comes to distances too long to bike, I'll return the bike at the train station and take another train again.

[@kaitlyn__L]

@@weetikissathe main drawback from an outside observer’s perspective would seem to be the per-bike-rental fee, as opposed to the monthly pass. Fine for if you only need it to and from one station, but wouldn’t you double pay if you travelled to another station for something else and then rented another OVfiets? That said it definitely seems like the only way it would really happen is if OVfiets would be converted to a “bike share” type operating plan. Mainly to increase the usage while it’s otherwise locked-up outside your work or friend’s house. With the flexibility increase as a side benefit.

[@ChristiaanHW]

@@TheTroyc1982 those OV-fietsen don't really get stolen, the thief has no where to sell them to because it's obvious it's a stolen bike. and all those bikes are chipped/gps tracked, so the thief gets caught really quick. it's just not worth it for a thief. if you go to another town and you need to go somewhere from that (train)station that's to far to bike. you just take another train or bus and end up in the town/neighbourhood where you need to be. and maybe rent an OV-fiets there. that's the ease of having one card/system (because nowadays we are able to use our bankcard or even phone) to pay/use every type of public transport in The Netherlands (including the OV-fiets). you always have the card/payment system with you.

[@RafalRzepecki]

I'm a European and take bike share for granted while traveling through most countries. I was shocked how difficult it was to get to use a bike in the Netherlands when I visited. In most cities on the continent I can set up an account in the local one or even use the same app and account I use at home and get riding in minutes for pennies.

[@zeugundso]

The multi modal use at 8:40 you describe is exactly what I think many people can't appreciate if they have not yet tried it. While I own an electric folding bike I way more use the non-electric bike share here in Nuremberg. In my commute it is the fastest way to get around when using it combined with a subway ride.

[@edipires15]

I’m from Luxembourg which has a public bike share system and am currently studying in the Netherlands. I have tried both and recognize the utility of public bike share, but I prefer the Dutch way. Public bike share is good for tourists or occasional riders, but for long-term use, it’s better to have your reliable bike than a public shared bike that may not be functioning properly (this is a problem throughout many bike share systems across Europe). In the Netherlands, everything within an 8km radius is reachable by bike within 30 minutes. So for these short distances, it’s just faster to go to your destination with your bike rather than take a combination of public transport and (hypothetical) bike share (and its associated costs). For longer trips, (to other Dutch cities for example) the combination of train + OV fiets is good enough for occasional trips. If you do these longer trips frequently, you can either have a second bike or rent a bike long-term (like a Swapfiets) available in that city.

[@Yvolve]

Simply put no, the Dutch are not missing out. When I commuted by train, I had a cheap bike at the other station and a good one at home. If you don't go to the same place all the time, there is already the OV fiets and that is pretty much the only time Dutch people will need it. It is so cheap to buy a second bike, it isn't worth paying for a share bike through a fee. 60,- buys you a pretty good omafiets, which is indestructible. It'll be more economical quite quickly. You also know the bike, know it will be there (unless it's stolen) and you don't have to go to a pickup and drop-off location. On top of this, those locations take away space for bike parking which is needed everywhere. It is kind of like asking if Americans and Canadians are missing out on car-sharing, since pretty much everyone already has a car. For countries where bikes aren't as common, share bikes are a great solution. A second bike is probably quite expensive and there isn't the infrastructure to park it safely, close to the station.

[@OhTheUrbanity]

I think you're falling into the trap of assuming that bike share is only for people who don't own bikes, but in the video we covered lots of advantages to us even though we do own bikes, like the multi-modal trip flexibility and not having to worry about theft or maintenance.

[@Yvolve]

​@@OhTheUrbanity I get the multi-modal trip flexibility, but the issues mentioned in the video aren't an issue in the Netherlands. All those transit gaps have been filled. One major issue the price. 10,-/month is expensive. My bike was 60,-, so that is 6 months. After that, every ride is free, no matter what. No Dutch person is going to have a bike subscription for that money. Especially if it costs money after 45 minutes. This isn't cheap, this is a waste of money to me. - I don't have to choose between a long walk to a library or a share bike, as I can take a connecting bus, making it a short walk in the end. - If I decide to have drinks after work, we'll go there on bike and I'll ride my bike home. Especially since public transport stops just after midnight. If you work in a city, almost nobody drives to work. The bar is close to work as everything is close, since it's the Netherlands. - Theft is annoying but not the end of the world if the bike was 60,-. If you have an oma fiets, it doesn't stand out anyway, so even less likely to get stolen. Parts are only stolen off abandoned bikes. I've lived in Amsterdam for a decade and my bike was stolen maybe 5 times. It was taken away by city council more often. Bike theft happens in large numbers because there are tons of bikes around, so many opportunities. It also used to be the norm to be able to buy a stolen bike from a junky on a Saturday night if yours was stolen by another junky. It was the Amsterdam Bicycle Exchange in essence. It isn't as much of an issue. The major thefts are e-bike nowadays, getting shipped to other European countries. - Dutch apartment buildings usually have small storage units on the ground floor, for stuff and your bike. Or you park it in a larger rack outside, along with many other bikes, so it doesn't stand out. - Maintenance is also negligible, even though we get salt in winter as well. A decent Dutch bike will last. I do not understand why nobody in Canada runs closed chain guards, even with derailers. Just regular rain kills chains, which is why all Dutch bikes have a proper guard. There isn't much maintenance outside of that on a sturdy city bike. Canada is also an extreme example in this case. - The biggest issue remains the space it requires to build the stations they're parked in. Space is at an absolute premium, so building a dedicated rack is going to either be very expensive or simply not possible. To be blunt, you're wrong on how much space they take up, comparatively. You are used to Canadian sized infrastructure. We simply don't have the space and if we do, it is used for general bike parking instead of dedicated, single use parking which is empty half the time. It is also an eye sore to be honest. - Abandoned bikes are cleared away. A sticker is wrapped around a wheel and part of the frame on ratty looking bikes. If it remains there for 14 days, it is taken away. If it is gone, it means the bike is in use. The bikes which are taken, are bought wholesale by bike shops. This is where many of the cheap bikes come from. OV fiets is connected to the OV chipkaart everyone already has, so a share bike company has to compete with them. When used after using the train, OV fiets is much cheaper. Besides this, there is always a bus you can take if you don't want to use an OV fiets. The majority of people have a regular commute, so they have a bike at the other station. For 60,- a bike, it isn't a bike investment and you save the money on public transport. I did this for a long time. So much easier. - No city council is going to subsidise a bike share program since everyone has a bike and public transport is good. That money is going to infrastructure everyone uses, not a company you need a subscription for. The bottom line is that all the issues you mentioned have been catered for. We've been at this for decades. Not to be arrogant, but in 2023, we're at the umpteenth iteration of a multimodal transport system. The vast majority of the kinks have been worked out. Trains, trams and busses have been planned to line up as best as possible, you can use a single app (9292ov) to plan a public transport journey throughout the entire country. If you're somewhere where you don't have a bike, taking a bus is easier and cheaper.

[@SaveMoneySavethePlanet]

3:38 yes! Bike theft was my first thought as well. I’ll almost always prefer taking my own bike somewhere just because I’m used to it and have it setup the way that I like. But if I plan to leave my bike locked up somewhere for a long period of time and am worried about theft than bike share is a great option. It’s also awesome for flexibility. Like if I meet up with a friend somewhere and they don’t ride, but then we want to go to a second place which is a short ride away…we’ll they can easily just grab a bike from the bike share and off we go!

[@FullLengthInterstates]

If a city has scooter culture, every home and business could choose to allow you to bring your scooter inside, and protect it from theft. Unlike bikes, scooters fit basically everywhere. Keeping scooters out of rooms is just a cultural issue, like whether a culture allows wearing shoes indoors.

[@JanAlbertdeLeur]

As a dutchie working at the regional government on cycling I really like your take on bicycle sharing and the flaws of the OVfiets scheme. I guess the biggest problem of making a working bikeshare system in NL is the needed scale - for the system to work it should be a region- or better nationwide system and with a thousands of bikes in every city at least. I would not give up on using my own bike in my hometown - but in the city where I work (Haarlem) and where I frequently visit (Alkmaar & Amsterdam) I would be awesome to use a cheap bike share system.

[@Ssarevok]

I originally wrote this a reply somewhere, but that might get buried more easily, so I'll put it up here, too. If this were to become popular and the company offering wants to assure availability of both bikes AND empty docking spots for drop-off, the amount of bikes and docking points needed would be insane. A medium sized city would need maybe 10.000 bikes seeded throughout the city and 10.000 or more EMTPY docking points for those people to park them, plus probaby a few thousand parked bikes for people arriving early before the influx of the main rush hour. (big cities like Amsterdam would need exponentially more bikes and spots probably) You'd also need a few thousand docking points at every high school once students decide that your bike-share scheme is a good idea. And those thousands would also need to be seeded near their houses to make it useful, so you'd hundreds of seed points with maybe a dozen bikes each (plus empty spots for anyone arriving with an extra bike). A counterpoint to how awesome it is even in non-Dutch places: when my brother and sister visited Berlin, they reported that the bike share was great, but once they wanted to park, the couldn't find an empty docking station where they wanted to go and had to park 3 docking spots further along. This made them late for dinner, which in their case, was a minor annoyance. But if you want it to commute, I don't thing managers or teachers would like it if their people keep coming in late because they couldn't find a place to park. My point is: if you want such a scheme to stay popular once it actually gets popular, you need to ensure availability, otherwise you'll become knows as the company with that "nice idea, but there's never any bikes because they're all in use (or people can't park because all docking spots are in use)". Like someone else mentioned in another comment: there have been attempts by companies with bike and moped sharing without fixed docking places, where you had to leave it within x meters of a GPS coordinate, but cities ended up with bikes and scooters blocking side-walks (nuisance to able-bodied person, no fun if you're in a wheel-chair or using a walker). I'm sure I thought of more stuff while watching the video, but can't remember all of them. :) Edit: thought of two more points: if you're trying to start this up, you'd logically want any docking spot in a convenient spot for bike parking. That means, you probably have to convince a city to not only remove a current bike parking spot, but also get a local ordinance to prohibit parking any other bikes at your docking points, otherwise they'll buried under privately-owned bikes. Also, once you've somehow managed to scale up to the numbers mentioned above, you probably want to occasionally shuttle some bikes back and forth to maintain availability and prevent overcrowding. For cities like Amsterdam, that would probably mean a fleet of trucks to maintain just the city... Edit2: As for OV-fiets: the only reason that gets around all the problems is because they only operate from the bigger stations, which lets someone keep and eye on them so it doesn't become a mess with the parking. Also, by mandating return to the same spot, you know there will always be parking spots for returning bikes. Like you mentioned: the downside is indeed that you're kinda forced to may daily flat rates, because people will go to where they want to go, do their thing there (work, shop, party, whatever) and then ride back to the station at the end of the day. The €5,00 rate is pretty comparable to a bus trip of the same distance, but with the benefit of not having to walk from the bus station.

[@rlwelch]

Bike share works great in Montreal and Toronto! I’d encourage you to learn more about how these programs work

[@RafalRzepecki]

Many bikeshares don't use docking points. I agree they are an inconvenience and they aren't really necessary with how cheap gps and connectivity has gotten. In my city (Wrocław) the bikes are dockless, however you pay an extra 1 eur if you leave it outside of designated spots ("stations") that used to be docks years ago, but now are simply geofenced designated areas. (Similarly you get extra credit if you bring a "floating" bike back to a station.)

[@nimrod06]

The "parking", if not for bike share, will be for personal bikes, which is way worse. The problems you described is why we need transit, not why we should not have bike share.

[@charlotte8666]

City bike works really well in NYC which is a huge city

[@tominator99988]

From Chicago, I agree with the Dutch. We have bike share (Divvy) in Chicago and I've never used it because it is only located in areas that well served by transit and walking. Biking is more valuable the farther you get from the urban center because there's bigger gaps between rail lines. For someone who lives 2 to 4 miles from their local train station, a $5 rental would be outstanding. One could take the bike home and drop it off at the train station the next morning. That system is easier than building bike share terminals everywhere. One potential issue is that this service could take away bike parking for people who own their own bikes. That would make a lot of people upset. This would need to be rolled out in a thoughtful way.

[@evelinedereu]

Adding in a dutch perspective: I never really considered bike sharing, but this video does show how it has a lot of potential and can potentially be great for a lot of cities. Of course, every city is slightly different, and thus the specifics of how will also be different from city to city, and country to country. So while I do agree that existing bike sharing/renting can be expanded to a lot of benefit, I don't necesarrily think the same exact model as used in Canada will fit the needs for most in the Netherlands as is. For some examples: I myself live in a place that is the border between large town and small city, having a lot of the benefits of good Urban design, but being small enough that all the amenities in town are comfortably in walking or cycling distance. I doubt bike sharing options would really have a lot of space here for stations to pick up and return them. So if I were to visit another city, the current 24 hour model for the OVfiets would cated to exactly this type of visitor. While biketheft is really big in Amsterdam, lots of other cities have put in measures to curb bike theft, and i only lost a bike once, and I'm still not sure if it was stolen, or more likely, confiscated for improper parking. So the bike theft angle doesn't add much appeal either, even when I did live in larger cities. Outside of the direct Randstad, I feel like most cities would not necesarrily benefit from having a bike sharing service that requires dedicated parking stations for them. Especially since a lot of businesses have direct bike parking available already. My own suggestion, if the governments have enough money for it, would be to expand the OV-fiets, while the 5 euros for 24 hours model is useful to me, for people who need it for a regular commute, a cheaper monthly subscription would be a much more appealing option, especially if employers can pay that cost for their employees. Secondly, a lot of cities I've lived in had protected indoors bike parking, One example that could help, is if these also served as pick-up and drop-off points for an OVfiets or similar service. (theoretically these could also work with a new service, but I think OVfiets has a larger chance of making this work, since the dutch government is the sole shareholder in the NS) these parking spots are usually near the city centre, the limit the parking inside it, but since that's often also where a lot of shopping centre's are positioned it would singificantly add viability to such a program. However, I think the big reason why bike sharing is not as popular here, is largely because we have managed to tackle most of the issues that bikesharing would combat, outside of Amsterdam, very few people really are concerned with bike theft. most of us know basic maintenance, and if not bike repair shops are quite common. And parking bikes is currently quite convenient at most destinations, while a bike share system would often require dedicated parking spots specifically only for those bike-share bikes, which I don't think a lot of businesses would see the value investing in currently.

[@jasper265]

I did a 50 minute bicycle commute to another town 2 times a week for a while. One time, my bicycle broke down catastrophically in the middle of the trip (probably related to lacking maintenance, I'm quite bad at maintenance in general). I walked into the small village I was near and dropped my bicycle off at the bicycle repair shop there (after waiting a bit for it to open). Bus service was somewhat challenging there, but yeah, bike repair shops are everywhere in this country...

[@jannetteberends8730]

Most people commuting by train have 2 bikes, one at each station. At the moment there are bike sharing programs in some cities, I’ve seen bikes of them. Don’t know if they are successful. The first bike share program in the world was actually Dutch. The so called “witte fietsen plan” by Provo. That was also the start of the anti car movement in the Netherlands. It failed for different reasons, but it is still used in some specific places.

[@Aidiakapi]

As a Dutch person, bike shares sound great. I think the reason we don't have it, is mostly because the whole concept of bike share came quite a lot later than when cycling became ubiquitous. That said, I'd love it if we got it at some point, but it really only works in denser areas. The main use I could see is for things like, taking the bus into the city, and then cycling home at night when busses don't run anymore, but that's pointless, since there won't be any stations near my home in an urban area. Other than that, negating the problem of theft, and not having to do maintenance are pretty darn convenient too, but I can see how many people are just happy with their own bikes. I've used the OV fiets a few times, and because it has to "work for everyone", they're rather uncomfortably small bikes, which makes them less appealing.

[@MrBaptista]

How tall are you? I'm 1.90m and found OV-Fiets pretty comfortable for my height.

[@weppwebb2885]

I am a sceptic of docked systems, but I am moving to a city that has them so maybe it will change my mind :) Karlsruhe has a dock less system that I use quite frequently. As a University student you get 30 mintues free for every ride after that just 50ct/30min(well "free", everyone pays a few euros per term). I think it's really useful because you can be even more spontaneous. For docked systems you need to know where you can return it and the docks at the university would be full every morning. Here I just scan a bike I walk past or check ghe app for bikes nearby. I don't usually see them blocking sidewalks or streets, the only disadvantage of dock less is, some people illegally take them into the house and you can't find the bike you are looking for.

[@humanecities]

All great reasons for bike share! Calgary has been experimenting with it - and has a LOT of scooters, too. I would love to see bike share integrated into the transit system. A holistic focus on transportation would be great!

[@FullLengthInterstates]

scooters are one thing that really don't need to be shared, except for tourists who visit by plane. scooters biggest strength is they do not require physical modifications to the world, people just have to choose to bring their scooter with them.

[@AustinSersen]

Absolutely! A key reason I don't ride my bike to the C-train is because of the rampant theft at the stations. A docked system might work well for most of central Calgary, but not so much where I currently live in a fairly low density part of the city where few would consider walking to a dock. Dockless integration might be the ultimate solution in Calgary with designated parking squares at major bus stops and train stations. In the meantime, I'll continue riding my bike 100% of the way to my destination or walking to a bus stop and taking Calgary Transit where I need to go.

[@PaigeMTL]

Doesn’t seem that long ago that we went down to Verdun and I pushed you guys to ride that bixi. Cost me $20 getting an eBixi out that long, but at the time I guessed it would be a good investment!

[@transitevolution]

As a Singaporean, bike share had a rocky start in 2017, leaving a mess everywhere as many venture capital companies imploded under a dockless system. But nowadays it has become a successful and convenient way for many people to commute on bicycle, since for the end-user, it is as if the bike can teleport everywhere. The system works well enough that from my knowledge, Anywheel, the company which runs the biggest bike share operation in Singapore, is now breaking even. Their bikes are single speed, but they are fast and robust. Many of our docking stations are also very simple: a painted yellow box and a QR code on already existing concrete pavement, some of them don't even have racks at all! You won't run out of bike parking most of the time, since you can always pack the bikes closer to one another.

[@Sordesman]

I just moved to DC and signed up for the CaBi bikeshare. It is hands down the most convenient way to get around the city. However, it is so good that docks are often empty!

[@micheltibon6552]

Same in Luxembourg, always gone or sometimes vandalized in certain neighbourhoods.

[@drewmagoo1]

I was in NL last year, and really struggled with looking for bike rentals. The one private bikeshare was really poorly maintained, and as the video said OV-fiets wasn't for foreigners. Even if it were, the system wouldn't have fit my use case. I visited DC a few months ago and spent 2 weeks riding around on the CaBis. My very first thought was "*this* is how it should be done!"

[@AutoGamerZ_]

Dutch person here: Bikeshare (and more commonly: Scooter share) actually does exist in many places, sometimes even by multiple providers but they tend to get relatively lightly used and the bikes end up absolutely everywhere they shouldn't be half of the time. Except if you're in a place you don't normally go too with unreasonably poor public transportation (Yes, we do have transport deserts here), they're basically never necessary because everyone who does need them for first/last mile transit, pretty much always already has a bike and because of how common (and cheap) just setting up a trasher bike at your place of destination is, they're rarely needed for that too. The only real situation where I've seen the hype about bikeshare actually emulated here is when public transport companies want to cut cost and they try to present bikeshare as an alternative for passengers who simply lose their connection. It generally doesn't work (even though a few benefit, most passengers just stay away) and provides no actual alternative for the people most reliant on public transport who often either can't handle the extra costs and/or just can't consistently cycle safely to begin with. Given the above, I've got mixed feelings about bikeshare systems. - Especially due to the way they're often used as an argument to destroy public transport under the guise of "increasing mobility".

[@jomme4300]

The description and also the spoken text in the video is a bit misleading. We do have bike-share here in some places in NL. As a matter of fact the turquoise/greenish looking bike at kzbin.info/www/bejne/kKPagGWeltaUgpo is one example of a bike-share in Utrecht. It's just not that popular. What I do really like is that there is also an 'e-bakfiets' /e-cargo-bike share option in Utrecht, that actually is somewhat popular, but more rare.

[@wesseldevries3]

Hi, I'm Dutch, and when I first started this video, I must say, I was quite sceptical about the practicality of a bikeshare system for the Netherlands. Now, however, I think you're right and we are missing out. It is a better solution to the last mile problem than the OV-fiets (I've often had to pick people up from the station because 5 euros for a trip from the station to my home and back seems a bit steep). I would mainly use it in other cities than my own, since I already own a bike (which on a per-month basis is still way cheaper than bikeshare, for a bigger upfront cost and the need to store and maintain it yourself). I think it would also lower the need for owning multiple bikes, like carshare services are lowering the need to own a (second) car. Also, I think that you're right on the OV-fiets being available to foreigners. It's a crying shame that it is so hard to obtain an OV-chipkaart. Now, we're making people get throwaway tickets and they cant use the OV-fiets bike rental system. Just make generic cards and slap on a big deposit, to be returned when the card is. The Netherlands still have a lot of opportunities to expand our public transit services. Thank you for your videos!

[@ChristiaanHW]

but does a foreigner want to pay a deposit of several hundred €. the big problem i think is that a company in The Netherlands doesn't have the means to get the money owned to them from a foreigners account in case of theft/destruction of the bike. so until that's figured out with foreign banks/governments companies don't want to risk all the costs of foreigners destroying their property and leaving the country before paying for the damages. if foreigners are able to pay with their bank cards to and those banks are obliged to transfer the funds even if the user doesn't have enough in their account. so the rental company is assured it gets it's money, i don't see a reason not to have the system being available to foreigners. what a lot of people forget/don't realize is that we in The Netherlands are spoiled with how easy it is to use digital payment options. a lot of places are years behind in that, and it takes some time for people from those countries to be able to use the systems made for our digital infrastructure. look at paying with Ideal or a Tikkie, those things are almost science fiction for some other (developed) countries. (for example: a lot of people in the US still get payed with checks from their employer)

[@TheLiamster]

London has a great bike share system. I see lots of people riding them all the time

[@rlwelch]

This video does an awesome job of highlighting the real superpower of bike share - the one way trip! I own a bike in Toronto, and I use bike share all the time. If had to give up access to bike share or my own bike, I’d give up my bike - the service is that useful

[@freudsigmund72]

As a dutchie who owns one bike, After seeing this video, I see no use for bikeshare for me. Maybe for big cities it has a use if you live small in an urban location, But other than that, nope. Also, the maintenance cost is pretty low. For my bike that I own, I spent less than € 100 over the past 18 years combined on maintenance.

[@13ccasto]

I am amazed at how low the subsidies for the bike share are! 68% covered by user fees is much higher than I'd expect

[@Riclamin_]

As a Dutch person I indeed have an opinion on bikes :P I think you have a very valid point about the OV fietsen. It often doesn't make sense to rent these for more than a full day. I think it could indeed be replaced by a bike share system instead. Regarding keeping the bikes safe; People either store them in their garage / shed, or when they live in an apartment building, there will be a locked area in the basement/ground floor where people can store their bikes. We do have an option for more long-term renting of bikes in some citiescalled swapfiets, which I believe also operates in Denmark and some parts of germany. They essentially lease bikes to you for a fixed fee of about 30 euros per month and they will do all maintenance on your bike. Whenever something's up you can just send them a message and they will replace your bike with an alternative one. Always love to hear your opinions! You have such great videos 😍😍

[@pineapplepizza27]

ive been thrilled to see my US city putting bikeshare stations all over the place. ive utilized it many times now. much cheaper than taking an uber which would be the only viable alternative for certain trips unfortunately many people seem to write it off as a gimmick but its so convenient

[@donnerwetter1905]

These bikes are often mistreated. I rather prefer to have my own bike and occasionally take transit.

[@Arjay404]

The thing is you need to think about when you are not in your own city, sure in your own city you can just use your own bike, but what if you are in another city? Will you have struggled to take your personal bike with you?Is that even an option? Many people might not want to do that as it can be a unpleasant experience, so if your own personal bike isn't available in that other city, what do you do? What solutions do you think are good?

[@donnerwetter1905]

@@Arjay404 Transit and I took my bicycle on a high speed train recently.

[@edipires15]

@@Arjay404the problem is that in this video they are trying to promote bike-sharing as an alternative for commuters. However, in the Netherlands, commuters using bike + public transport would certainly have a second bike in the city where they work, either an OV-fiets whose costs are covered by their employer, a long-term rental like a swapfiets, or a personal bike. Also one of their arguments is that the subscription price would be low. Well, the price is low where they live because it is subsidized, that wouldn't be the case in the Netherlands. Why would city councils use taxpayer money to subsidize bike-sharing programs that would be used occasionally by a few people? Moreover, that subscription is only to have access to the shared bikes, not for actual use. And it would certainly not be free for 30 minutes. Just taking these points into account would make a hypothetical bike-sharing system less appealing than for example renting an OV-fiets, let alone the other points (space for bike-sharing docks, being dependent on the location of the docks, etc)

[@gustavoa3342]

They kinda started the bike share idea with the provo white bicycle plan back in the 60s but only more based. They collected several hundred bikes, painted them white, and left them around the city to be freely used.

[@jannetteberends8730]

That was the first bike share program in the world. 😊

[@gustavoa3342]

yep@@jannetteberends8730

[@Arjay404]

I personally don't want these companies over here because many of these companies are the same companies that invaded cities with their scooters and the disrespectful way that they introduced their dockless vehicles into cities and didn't seem to care about what impact their vehicles and the way that their users treated and left their vehicles has soured me on them. Instead I think that the OV fiets system could be expanded, instead of having OV fiets only available at train stations they could expand the system to have ov fiets stations at every major bus stop (Bus stops where say more than 4 lines converge, at each neighborhood's shopping "square" (pretty much every neighborhood in NL has this spot where a bunch of shops are grouped together.), in front of schools, parks and any major location like these. Open the system up for tourist to use, since I honestly don't know why they don't allow tourists to use the system, except maybe they are worried for their safety. And then finally have the option to pay for shorter trips and a subscription system. Many people that need to use a bike to get to work after they take a train to another city will simply buy another another bike and keep it parked at the station of that other city, but it would be nice to not have to do that and avoid the possibility of arriving at the station and finding out you had a flat or that some punk kids let out the air out of your tires, but for that to be a option it needs to be well priced because as you mentioned we can buy a second hand bike here for under 100 Euros.

[@OhTheUrbanity]

The ideal for bike share is to be publicly-owned, like in Montreal and Toronto, where they're owned by the city.

[@MonsieurRaki]

I think they don't allow tourists to use it, because bike rental shops are more expensive.. So it's a way to make a lot more money off of these tourists. They know tourists will most likely want to bike, so that drives up the price. OV-fiets is for small time use, so it's less expensive. It's a public service for Dutch people and not made for tourists... but maybe there's a way around it, if tourists can order an OV-kaart in advance...

[@BotchFrivarg]

I think here in the Netherlands it is also a bit of a chicken and egg situation, due to most people who want to bike already owning a bike initial bike share offerings have a hard time getting of the ground (due to e.g. only being available in a single region/town, to few bikes available. not enough infrastructure to manage those bikes, etc driving up expenses), and this then contributes to the view that bike share are not needed here, or don't fit. (also the few companies that tried often used smartphone apps with no fixed bike stands, meaning people left the bikes just wherever irritating other road users (often pedestrians)). That said I do think a good, nation wide system, could be beneficial, though probably will not happen currently for reason that have not much to do if it is a good idea or not.

[@RinoaL]

I feel like it'd be best to have the personal discipline to just have your own bike. Costs way less too. I bought my bike used for 20$ and it's been good for years so far. Bikeshare is just you paying some company to take care of your bike for you, and I'd rather do that myself for free. I already can't afford a phone bill as it is.

[@MonsieurRaki]

The Dutch are hyper-practical people. If it was more practical to use this, we would.. but for us it isn't... 10 dollars a month is 120 dollars a year... We can buy a decent (secondhand) bike for that price and store it in our garages/sheds... So no need to walk somewhere where these shared bikes are stored, we can just hop in the garage and take our bike. We do have bicycle theft, but we know where to store them so it doesn't get stolen as often.. Plus we have a lot of public bike storage now, so a safe environment makes it less likely for your bike to get stolen. I've lost some bikes in the 90's, but my bike hasn't been stolen in 20+ years. The OV-fiets is great to use... It is expensive, but we only use that if we really need to. Usually for work, so our employers pay for the transport. If we would need a bike at the station every day, we would just buy a second bike and store it at the 2nd station and some take a foldable bike in the train. Students who usually take transit, have a free public transit pass to travel to school, so they also don't need a shared bike service and they also have their own bikes. So while maybe a few tourists would use this, the Dutch people wouldn't... We are frugal... Getting a 2nd bike for that price pays for itself after 1 year... With our own bike we can just ride home and don't have to store it somewhere and then walk home.. That's not efficient to us... We have some car share services that are a hassle for that same reason...

[@ChristiaanHW]

exactly Dutch efficiency has made bike share redundant even before bike share came knocking on our doors. they just came to late and now we don't need/want them.

[@appa609]

way to toot your own horn

[@Bananadoom]

I think the Netherlands might have too many cyclists for a succesful bike share. The difference in cyclist volumes between the Netherlands and most other countries is hard to overstate. Put it this way: I live in a Dutch city with far less than 10% of Montreal's population, yet every single bike in Montreal's Bixi bike share scheme could easily fit into the underground bike parking at my city's central station (without touching the 1000s of surface bike racks). If a bike share scheme became popular in one of the larger Dutch cities, like Amsterdam or Utrecht, it could require many 100,000s of bikes. But that means everything else would also need to be scaled up by at least an order of magnitude. Even if the docking stations don't take up much space in Montreal, the ones in the Netherlands would have to be 10 times the size. You would need an entire fleet of trucks driving around the city 24/7 to reposition bikes. When there is a surge of activity to an usual location (e.g. a festival) you could end up with every dock in several kilometers being claimed. You would have to build huge new structures at the major stations for all the docks because even the staggered arrangement is only about 1/4 as space efficient as the high density two story racks currently used at Dutch stations (that's one of the reasons OV fiets tends not to use docks, they have limited space and they like to stack bikes close together). I really would like to see a bike share scheme in the country, and I hope I'm wrong about this. But I feel any scheme is either doomed to failure or becoming a victim of its own success.

[@rolandxb3581]

Great points! I think the only case for bike sharing in the Netherlands is as a supplementary option, it can't replace all bike traffic.

[@MarcelVolker]

I do think this reply hits on a very important point that has not been mentioned elsewhere - the sheer volume of bike journeys in the Netherlands. It's all nice seeing those Bixi stands with space for 15 bikes next to a supermarket or maybe 50 next to a station... so cute! But scaling that to the level required for the enormous amount of demand in the Netherlands where even bike parking with 10s of 1,000s of spaces fill up every day, hundreds of bikes at shopping centres... very hard to see that scale up.

[@VaguelyJubilant]

@@MarcelVolker The large bike parking lots seems like an argument FOR bikeshare, not against. Instead of having to store all of those bikes sitting idle for long periods of time, a bikeshare system would allow multiple people to use the same bike during the day.

[@alexseguin5245]

@@MarcelVolker Seems more like an argument for bikeshare, honestly. From what I've seen, a lot of people tend to store a second bike of theirs in a bike parking so that they can use it after taking the train. That means that you've got bikes sitting idle 98% of the time in a parking somewhere, instead of being used constantly during the day going from location to location. Even if you end up with about 10% of users in a given Dutch city going for bikeshare instead of their own bike, that means you can take the space from about 10% of an underground parking, or perhaps even less.

[@ChristiaanHW]

@@VaguelyJubilant it might seem so but in realty it isn't. during morning rush hour a lot of people go from home to work. during the day they are at work. at the end of the day they return home. the amount of people going in the other way or just going around town during work hours is really low. so bike share would end up just like normal bikes. going one way in the morning and the other way in the afternoon. and during events bike share would be overwhelmed and wouldn't add anything substantial. bike share is great for other places but in The Netherlands it's to late to the party and we already have a good (probably even better) system in place.

[@jasonriddell]

IMHO as a Canadian watching Dutch VIDS - my thought is that the usage would be VERY LOW compared to the LEVEL of build out the netwrk requires to function and with OV-fiet being part of the "public transit" network the shown model works "better" for commuters as there WILL BE a bike waiting for your homeward trip as it is "YOURS" VS a share bike that likely is NOT available when EVEYBODY is taking one at the SAME time and the AMOUNT of labour to MOVE that number of bikes to be ready for the RUSH home / to work OV-fiets only HAS to make sure all the bikes get returned to the CORRECT station which I assume is BILLED to the renter if NOT

[@edipires15]

Non-Dutch person currently studying in the Netherlands: you make some (very) good arguments for having a public bike share, but I don't think these arguments hold for the Netherlands. We are talking about a country where there are more bikes than actual people. With long-term rentals like Swapfiets, occasional rentals like OV-fiets and even dockless scooter share systems covering pretty much every multimodality need in the Netherlands, the demand for a general public bike share simply isn't there. That doesn't mean that bike-sharing systems don't exist in the Netherlands (Rotterdam has a few private ones) but I don't think city councils have to provide public bike-sharing when they already provide excellent bike infrastructure.

[@RogerAckroid]

The main issue I'd love to see solved with bike share is transport of kids. On my bike I've got children seats (even 2, one in the front, 1 in the back). With bike share I can't transport them. And if they were older I couldn't find children size bikes. Even if my city offered cargo bikes (which I don't think they do) they would be rare and you couldn't reliably find them.

[@julians.2597]

3:27 Insurance. Really, it's been a game changer for me. Get decent insurance and stop worrying. (ofc it's shitty that it's "necessary", but for the current situation it's the best solution at least for me)

[@SeeNickView]

I wonder if a registration system for all bike parts, seat, wheel, frame, etc., would help with theft. Maybe interlocking methods or better locks between the bike components, such as an integral lock between the seat and frame, would be a good enough deterrent for bad actors. I always worry about capacity with bike sharing. You don't really know how many bikes might be available nearest to you (you might check apps, but again once you check the app you can see what's available or not), and there might not be socket capacity for when you need to drop your bike off. You might be able to manage this as a user by using apps and looking ahead for where to drop your bike off and then walk the rest of the way, but that's an additional variable to consider. I'm tall too so the one size fits all approach to these models might not work for me, especially if I'm approaching those 45 minute boundaries. I think bike sharing still has a purpose, even for someone like me. It's all about redundancy and resilience. If my bike is in the shop for maintenance, then I'd still like to have mobility during the outage. I could buy another bike, but that's a hassle because it's another piece of equipment I'll need to keep up on. And since I wouldn't be riding that one every day, I'd need to do more planning to make sure the spare would be in good working order before the outage. Bike sharing would be a stress reliever for these kinds of situations. Spontaneity is also a perk with these services where you could pick up a bike nearby for meeting up somewhere with friends or whatever. When you bring your bike you have to plan to have it with you all day, and have to manage possession. Despite all of this, I still think there's a place for this service in most urban communities. Those that the service doesn't really serve them well might still benefit from it from time to time. Great video!

[@vanhaven7331]

In the Netherlands, we also have a private service called Swapfiets: you pay around €20 a month on the most basic plan for a "rental" bike that actually stays in your possession for as long as your subscription continues. You can treat it as basically your own bike: you use it as often as you like, no restrictions, and you can park it anywhere you want. I've been using the same Sawpfiets bike for over a year now and I must say it's a great service. The subscription fees also include maintenance on the bike, and in case it gets too damaged you can swap it for a new one. Also, if it gets stolen, you also get a replacement and only pay a small fine if you can prove it was locked, i.e.: you have the key in your possession (they key can only be pulled out of the lock when it's locked). If you didn't do it, then you pay a full fine, which is the price of the bike itself. I consider it to be superior than the usual bike share services.

[@shadbeard3275]

Good video and I do love the bike share in my city, but not mentioning Swapfiets is a bit of a miss. It’s a cheap (€17-20/month) alternative to North America bike share and is in most places. Although, if your bike is stolen, it’s €60. Personally, I would love Swapfiets in the US as well as bike share.

[@OhTheUrbanity]

I'm curious, what are the main use cases for Swapfiets?

[@shadbeard3275]

For me, I am here for 2 months and I use it as a cheap bike rental. I use for all my biking needs within a city. If you move to a different city, you can just return it and transfer to a different city. But I’m a bit of an abnormal case. When I arrived in Utrecht, it was the beginning of the school year, and there were tons of students getting them. I feel like if it was available in the US, I would use it similar to how I use bike share. Sometimes I don’t want to store my more expensive bike for a long period and would like a less risky option that I can ride door to door without having to dock it or hope that a good bike is available. But the other major advantage is that if something breaks, they will either come and fix it or you can just swap it out for a new one. There’s an app that you can schedule them to come to you or bring it back to them (your choice) to swap it out. They are also typically very close to the train station.

[@shadbeard3275]

Admittedly, it’s supposed to be a longer term thing and it is discounted if you pay yearly.

[@lws7394]

@@OhTheUrbanity I would say foreign students (or other folk) who stay for a couple of months in a town and buggers who are too lazy/clumsy to repare a flat tyre and don't make the numbers to see how expensive Swapfiets really is . For €220 might buy 2 second hand bikes each year. I have to say €10 for free 45min use of share bikes sounds really good, provided there are enough, nearby, docking stations !! I think there is not enough critical mass for a widespread share bike system. Apart from A'dam and R'dam there are really not many towns where people would consider this in their hometown. (And those two cities are not that big ..). Most cities are just not sprawled enough, not even The Hague, I think. People will use their own bike ...So the system mostly would basically serve people visiting other cities in the Randstad ( or elsewhere ) . I could use such this year I have to go by train&bus to a village. But you don't see this service in the country side..

[@justinbodeutsch6862]

In Utrecht this June I was surprised to see Swapfiets being maybe 10-20% of bikes. Once I knew to look for the blue tire I saw them everywhere. I would have gotten one but I was only there a week so I just used a bike shop. NJB did a video where he talked about using Swapfiets for a couple months. He rode his bike to the station and then parked his Swapfiets at the other station to get to work.

[@ilpalozzo]

I use bike share in a small Irish city. €10 euro a year and first 30 minutes of each ride free which covers 95% of rides. For longer rides I just stop at a the next docking station put it in then take it back out for anther 30 minutes. I think ive only paid an additional 50 cent twice in like 5 years

[@joglijogli6898]

I can’t think of a reason why bike share is necessary in The Netherlands. When you talk about The Netherlands you seem to think everyone lives in a city centre in Amsterdam. Which is not the case. Most people live in commuter towns or residential areas of a city. Most people use their bicycle every day to do their grocery shopping, going to the sports club in the evening , cycle to work or school in the early morning, to the train station and sometimes just recreational. Many young people cycle to the city center when they go out partying on Saturday night so they can drink. Many families bring or pick up their kids from school and buying groceries on the way back. I think it’s not very handy to search for a bike share station to find a bicycle. When you use a bicycle every day you want to be fit for you. And it’s much more convenient a bicycle is always available, don’t have to search for it and don’t have a time limit. Maintenance is not a problem. Small repairs can be done the average Dutch. Larger issues can be done by a bike repair shop. Theft is a problem but you can buy good lock at a bike store. And lots of people have two bikes; one cheap second hand for short trips which isn’t likely to be stolen. And a more expensive one, often an e-bike which can be used for longer distances. Back share seems great for city centers of large cities especially tourists. But not for people who use a bicycle every day doing multiple things living in a outskirt of a city or a commuter town like most Dutch people.

[@ChristiaanHW]

yeah one of the big reasons why bike share don't takes off in The Netherlands is that the country is build to accommodate bikes. so people find using their own bike already really convenient and bike share doesn't add anything for us. bike share just came to late to be able to find it's place in The Netherlands, for us it would be like taking a step back not forward.

[@joglijogli6898]

@@ChristiaanHW that is one reason. But it’s also very impractical to have to search for a bike every time you want to cycle. For example, people do their daily grocery shopping using a bike. Most people live in a residential area. So when you want to buy your diner you first need to walk to a bike station which probably is halfway on the way to the supermarket. Hopefully there is a bike. I am quite tall so you have to adjust the bike. Cycle to the supermarket. Buy you groceries constantly watching your watch because there is a time limit apparently for bike share. You cycle back to the bike station with your groceries. Probably those bike from the bike sharing doesn’t have a basket to put your groceries in unlike your own bike. From the bike station you still have to walk to your home. According to oh the urbanity this is useful? I don’t see the point of it.

[@ChristiaanHW]

@@joglijogli6898 yes and in places where they lack the bike infrastructure they wouldn't be as likely to have a bike at home, because it's not as easy to cycle to your house as in The Netherlands. So they don't mind to walk to a docking station. While becasue in The Netherlands we have safe and practical door to door cycle infrastructure. We are less inclined to walk sonewhere, get a bike, park the bike, and walk to our destination. So because our infrastructure is more cycle inclusive we don't have a need for bike share services.

[@faithfuljohn]

The Dutch aren't perfect??? @NotJustBikes may be a little shocked!

[@10hawell]

Same as I don't want to be a rentoid, i don't want to share a bike, I'm not wealthy, it's more wise for long term budget to own what you use. Very hyper capitalist of you to want subscription based everything. But go live rich stay poor.

[@RinoaL]

If your vehicle can only transport one person at a time, it should only have one owner. Bikeshare just adds complication for everday use. It should only be used when visiting a city that isn't your home.

[@OhTheUrbanity]

But all of the advantages apply in the city we live in!

[@clubdjmarcus]

You still need to pick up the bike from the rack(if it is not close) and bring it to another rack when finished. A lot of students have one bike for the ride to the train station and one for the ride to the end point (like college) even some commuters have that. Theft is not really an issue if your bike isn't new, so a lot of bikes look like crap but still work perfectly. Also most people can do the simple maintenance or know someone in the family who can. And used bikes are really cheap.... Cheaper than your 'cheap service ' for a year...

[@Cl0ckcl0ck]

I think the main problem is that transit to work is mainly one-way two times a day. Thousands go left and nobody is going right kinda thing. Bike share works with circulation and on work days there isn't (hardly) any. We should have mixed workspace and living space up more but we didn't.

[@dwc1964]

Side note: It would sure be nice if the vehicles they used to schlep bicycles around between docks & maintenance were electric. That's one of the best use cases for EVs vs ICE.

[@zaydansari4408]

My dad realized he could ride his own bike to the local suburban train station and then get on the train and then use a bike share bike from the dock at the downtown station to get to work and return the bike at the bike dock that’s a block away from the office. He doesn’t need to take his bike on the train (even though they started allowing bikes on all trains recently), and doesn’t need to lock his own bike in downtown where theft is more common. He can also choose to take a bus if it start raining there and a family member can pick him up from the local station if it starts raining here.

[@monowheeling]

Bike share is awesome, but I find the lack of decent reliability the biggest disadvantage. In my experience, it's not quite the "guaranteed cycling experience _whenever we want_ " [3:57]. At least in Paris, it is neither guaranteed to find a (functional) bike at any nearby station to start a trip, nor to find a parking space at a nearby station at the end of the trip.

[@GladmanNow]

My son is a grad student in the Netherlands and rents a bike with a monthly charge. If the bike needs repair or is stolen it will be replaced.

[@matthewconstantine5015]

Washington DC's Capital BikeShare is growing and becoming more and more useful. I find its price structure a bit weird and and it doesn't really help me specifically. Being stuck way out in the suburbs, it would be a great option to take a bikeshare to the nearest Metro station, especially since buses stop running at like 9PM. They've recently installed a dock at my local Metro station, but there's only one other dock out in this area, and it's not much further away than across a big parking lot, so not much use. Hopefully the expand to be more useful.

[@andrelukin6364]

Send a note to your local council and other elected officials in your area asking to extend the bike share program to specific locations (ask your friends do the same). It will help!

[@davethibault6734]

I've used Bixi in the past, but in all honesty: I prefer to use my own foldable eBike to get around Montreal. The Bixi's are too heavy and often struggle going uphill. Which for me is a dealbreaker since where I live usually requires me to ride uphill.

[@wl03bu]

You forgot biking to a party, getting hammered, then uber/transit back home.

[@robinwolferink7315]

bike sharing seems nice but a system with docking stations is simply not scalable to the dutch cycle intensity.

[@JH-pe3ro]

San Francisco's Baywheels system currently removes the e-bike fee if you undock from a dock that has no "classic" bikes listed. Once I learned about this secret discount, I started using the e-bikes more often, opportunistically. I suspect that they're actually transitioning out the classics as time goes on because other parts of the bike fail much more often than the battery. So the effect I'm feeling is that as I continue using the service more and paying my modest $169/year membership, I am getting more mobility: the number of stations expand, the city makes more moves towards cycling infrastructure, and the bikes themselves go faster(which I don't always want, but it is a pleasure to feel them accelerate). I don't feel this same effect with a transit pass, because transit isn't adding capacity in this way, at this rate. While it's easy to end up paying more with a bikeshare by ignoring the per-minute fee, it's also not hard to use it and only pay the base cost. If I bought an e-bike instead, I'd be paying for something like 10 years of membership, plus maintenance costs, risk of theft, etc. I don't think the Netherlands is positioned in the same way, since the networks and bicycle fleets are already there; the appeal would most likely come from seeing the bikeshare as a convenient way to "upgrade" to e-bike.

[@ltandrepants]

If you pay a membership fee , it is not free

[@OhTheUrbanity]

The membership is cheap and then after that, each ride is free. That changes how you use it compared to if we had to pay for each trip.

[@MLint]

the number of bikes you have to have for bike sharing? There +/- 9.000.000 travels by bike per day in The Netherlands. When I wanne go to home after a day of work and there is no bike in the bike share ... GRRRR. Your own bike is your way to travel in your city, OV fiets is your way when you are not in your city.

[@OhTheUrbanity]

One of us commutes by bike share most days and there isn't really ever a problem finding a bike at the end of the work day.

[@kotelypiesely1268]

renting a cargo bike makes sense because they're huge things and you don't exactly need something like that every day leasing out/test driving a hi-end bike makes sense, because you wanna test out the new tech and get a feel for what you're paying extra for renting a city bike makes no sense because you can probably get one for yourself for not much more and it's going to have more features than the rental

[@OhTheUrbanity]

What about all of the use cases we covered in the video, and the distinction we made between a "rental" and bike share?

[@hahafalseflag5090]

I'm with the dutch.. I rather own my bike especially when you use your bike as much as the dutch do..

[@OhTheUrbanity]

We own bikes and use bike share. It's not really a question of deciding whether to own.

[@FrostyShadowYT]

I don't really get the argument of going to a bar with coworkers. Most coworkers will often come to the office on their bikes as well, so we just cycle together to the bar, and the ones that didn't will take the metro. The weather also is a bad argument for the Netherlands because here people are not scared of rain and will still cycle. I regularly cycle to a train station on my bike, as do other people, so that covers multi-modal trips together with ov-fiets on the other side. There really isn't that many use-cases for a bike share that is not covered by your own bike or ov-fiets. Bike share only really makes sense to me if I don't have my own bike, and that's what I did before I bought my bike, I used Lime eBikes to get around the city. But now with my own bike, I don't see a reason to not use it.

[@TheTroyc1982]

In North America you have the option to bike in the rain or not if you don't feel like getting wet that day with bikeshare also if it starts raining after you get to your destination you can take a non-bike form of transit home without worrying about where you left your bike.

[@schroedingerscat5405]

In Hamburg we have StadtRad it is 5€ for the year and the first 30 min of a ride are free and every minute after cost 10 cent (caps at 9€ for the day). I tend to just get a bike if the weather is good and I am not at home to use my own bike or the weather is very swingy.

[@maickelwand9100]

We used to have a few bike share options in Amsterdam, around 6 years ago. It resulted in abandoned bikes everywhere. The municipality has stopped these bike sharing experiments after about 6 months.

[@robertn2951]

As a Montrealer I can tell you that bike share is a scam: they take way to much space and often, we have a hard time finding parking space for normal bikes. The Dutch, they don't pretend to be a biking nation, they are one. Montrealers take the bike sharing to go down the hill, downtown. They call a Uber when it's time to go uphill...

[@tcniatcniatcnia]

Honestly, I had mixed thoughts before clicking but after hearing your points I 100% agree. I would definitely use something like that if I had it in my city.

[@ehoops31]

Curious your thoughts on docked vs dockless bikeshare. I could see ova fiets being nice because you know your bike will still be there after work. We have a semi-docked system where there are hubs, but you don’t have to return a bike to one at the end (it’s cheaper if you do return them though). In SF I had issues riding to work because I would get there and the rack would be full. I would end up riding halfway back to the train to find a dock. On the other hand, knowing there’s a dock nearby is nice because there will most likely be a bike to pick up.

[@emma70707]

I used Citibikes in NYC and various dockless outfits here in Seattle and prefer dockless. It's really annoying when some idiot leaves a share bike in the middle of the bike lane or sidewalk, tbf, but that's pretty rare since they make you take a picture. I only run into issues with them being terribly parked like once every 6 months at this point. If I'm going to take the light rail somewhere, I just check the two apps to make sure there are a couple at my end stop. As a user of them, dockless is definitely preferable. You don't get a guarantee of a bike being there in either case (and all spots where there would be docks are spots where they'd be redistributing bikes anyway overnight or throughout the day for places like light rail stops so I don't count that as an advantage), but you get way more usability for parking, which means you often have much better chance of having your bike there when you want to grab it for the ride home if you're in a weird spot. If you have enough density of docks like NYC probably does at this point (I was there like 8 years ago), it's not a huge deal, but I remember being annoyed a lot of the time that I'd walked multiple blocks to find them empty or had the same issue with you of docks being full. For less dense cities like SF and Seattle, I feel like dockless is the way to go...

[@ChristiaanHW]

dockless systems are a nightmare. people are selfish so they will just park the bike as close to their destination as possible no matter how much it annoys/inconveniences other people. with those dockless systems you end up with bikes everywhere, cluttering the streets, parks and sidewalks. that's one of the reasons The Netherlands doesn't like bike share systems (or those electric scooter)

[@tomreingold4024]

My wife and I had a date with a friend at a movie theater. She lives in our neighborhood. My wife and I rode Citi Bike (NYC's bike share) to the theater. After the movie, we walked home with our friend because our friend doesn't ride bikes. So we got to ride one way. We can't do that with our own bikes.

[@ChristiaanHW]

in the Netherlands we would have offered that friend either to ride on the back of the bike or even on the rod connecting the saddle part with the steering part of the bike. so for us it wouldn't be problem to have someone "extra" on the ride home. or we just walk with the bikes in hand. if you grow up with those options it's a lot more normal to do so.

[@Imthefake]

i use a bike share in the morning to go to the metro station because im usually in a hurry, then when im goingback home in the evening i have more time and usually take a walk

[@mdhazeldine]

As a Londoner (real London), it boggles my mind that the Netherlands doesn't do bike share. I've heard all the arguments against it, but they fail to address a few points 1) More choice is always better. Not everyone will benefit from bike share, but SOME people will, and it's hard to predict who will until you provide the option. 2) It would be super useful for tourists, which are abundant especially in Amsterdam, and especially when OV Fiets isn't available to foreigners (which is completely dumb by the way). 3) OV Fiets sounds like a good system, but I agree that it seems overkill to rent a bike for 24hrs, only to ride it for 20 minutes and have it stored at your office all day. If people docked their bike at a docking station near their office, it would not only be cheaper, but that bike could then be used by other people during the day, massively reducing the amount of bikes that need to be provided, maintained and stored.

[@ChristiaanHW]

to answer you're points from a Dutch perspective: 1. yes more choice is often better. but the amount of people that will benefit from bike sharing services is really low over here. most people have several bikes. one for choirs that's a bit run down and one for more leisure kinds of uses, and those are how we like so we don't really like a generic option. and because of the low demand those docking stations will be really inefficient and take up valuable space better used by either our own bikes or by some bushes, grass or trees. 2. yes tourist are a customer base that will benefit. but the big tourist cities already have rental services (and some even have bike share) available. downside is those tourist are often not that concerned with leaving the city in a nice orderly way so those bikes get left everywhere. (like the electric scooter problem in Paris) 3. only people that have the money to pay for an OV-fiets or people that get compensated by their employer use them regularly, so the price is not a problem for the regular users. people that don't want to pay for an OV-fiets often use the 2 bike system. meaning that they use a bike to get from home to public transport, use public transport to get close to their destination, and have a 2nd bike ready for them over there to get to their destination. and all stations have bike parking/storage and even the bigger bus/tram stops have a place for people to park there bikes. two of the biggest reasons why Dutch people don't need bike share are: 1. we all own at least one bike, so we don't feel the need to pay for something we already own. 2. we have a public transit system that is integrated with our bike infrastructure, so it's really convenient to use our own bikes and public transport in whatever combination we need.

[@mdhazeldine]

@@ChristiaanHW Your points are good ones, but they ignore some of the counter points in the video and don't totally invalidate my points. The one about bikes being left all over the place is annoying, but docking stations overcome that one. It works in London so it could work in Amsterdam. Tourists are a huge market in Amsterdam so I think bike share would go down well in the city centre at least. We also have good public transport in London (admittedly with less good bike storage) and tons of people use bike share here. Just because the market will be smaller, doesn't mean it shouldn't or couldn't be done.

[@ChristiaanHW]

@@mdhazeldine the problem in Amsterdam (specifically) is that tourist already are a big cause of trouble for the city and residents. and i doubt a lot of Amsterdammers want to add hundreds of people that can barely cycle to that, clogging up the limited space available to cycling (most cycle paths in Amsterdam are too small already). so the system already in place is more in Amsterdams favor, people that want to cycle are still able to find options for it but you have to do a little research to find out how to obtain a bike. so not everyone has the ability to just rent a bike and try to go for it. and in the video they mention that those bike share systems are partially subsidized by the municipality. so the city has to fund a bike share that will make the city less pleasant for the residents to live in. also where would they place those docking stations, in the center where the canals are there's simple no space for them. so in for Amsterdam and a lot of The Netherlands a new bike share system wouldn't add any real benefit but will add a few negatives. so the support and necessity simple isn't there. for example we get a lot of tourist from Germany every year and a lot of them that want to cycle over here just take their bikes with them on vacation. so even on the tourist front we already have part of the problem solved. and campings often offer some kind a rental service to. we do have rental services but they aren't the system where you have these docking stations everywhere.

[@SharienGaming]

theres absolutely good usecases for bikeshares... but when bikes are incredibly ubiquitous, the whole operation becomes less feasible, as fewer people would use the service but as a public utility with dedicated stations that are maintained i can absolutely see it as a great addition to a public transit system PS: i can especially see it as a useful system for visitors and tourists, because long distance transport of your own bike isnt really feasible most of the time either

[@pavld335]

I own a bike and still use bike share, because there are going to be situations where I don't have my bike with me. And there are plenty of sitatutions where it is needed.

[@woutervanr]

Before watching the video, I have to note that we have public transport bicycles you can rent at every station for 4.50 a day. Just tap your PT card and you can park it anywhere in the city and take it back at the end of your day. Now let's see what you have to say 😊

[@OhTheUrbanity]

OV-Fiets is great for tourists and day-trippers (unfortunately not available to foreigners though). But it seems like overkill as a last-mile solution for commuters! €4.50 is a lot of money to spend on just part of your commute.

[@woutervanr]

Agreed. Just like a car, it's then just standing there 90% of the time. Compared to 10 dollars a month it's also definitely a worse deal. We're solving the space issue with all kinds of underground parking now it seems. Atleast at stations. And while you might not have to maintain the bike share bicycle, I think very few dutch people that own a cheap bike have theirs maintained either, haha.

[@MrBaptista]

OV-Fiets can be used by foreigners. I've just came from the Netherlands and used it. You do have to have an OV card that can be bought online but it can only be shipped to a Dutch address, though. It makes it almost inaccessible to foreigners, but they can use it. Let's hope that at some point OV cards can be bought at train stations. I do get the point on OV-Fiets. It's designed for when you travel to another city, as it's available nationwide. And it works really well. I guess they don't need it for last mile or commuting because they already invested heavily in safe bike parking in homes, train stations and office buildings so it's very convenient for people to use their own bikes. And there's also Swapfiets if you don't want to have your own bike or deal with maintenance or theft

[@extrastuff9463]

I got the impression it can be sent to other countries when I just had a look at the application form after watching this video... as long as they are on this short list: Germany, Belgium, Luxembourgh. And there was a cryptic hint that it might be possible? "Do you have a foreign IBAN but do you not live in the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany or Luxembourg? Please fill in our contact form and we will help you further. You can apply for an OV-chipkaart with any valid IBAN.". Additionally I noticed whenever I would click on the form to add the OV fiets product to an OV chipkaart it would send me to the Dutch version of the NS webshop even from the english page. And switching language there with the "English" button in the top right would cause me to leave the webshop. Tried getting there in various ways but it just wasn't letting me, it's not friendly at all even for people who live here but don't read Dutch yet. I kinda get why NS set it up this way as they mostly serve domestic train/public transit users, providing this bicycle service is already an extra thing to do. If they had to it to handle peak tourist capacity as well they'd need a lot more bicycles and staff that aren't needed outside the season. Still it would be nice if there was a quick way to buy a (temporary) card for a few weeks at the bicycle facility of whatever train station, they could even slap on a large deposit in case of damage/theft/loss that gets returned when the card is returned. If capacity is an issue I guess they could limit the number of active temporary cards by just stopping sales as needed. I suspect they might even have reduced demand during peak tourist visiting periods if it overlaps with our own summer vacations since less commuters will be going to and from work. Swapfiets is a good suggestion if you want a decent bicycle but not buy one, I suspect it's only really a good option for a whole month or ideally longer. Not a relatively short stay in the country of let's say a few days/weeks. Seems like a bit of a hassle to get a contract for one and then cancel it afterwards, probably comes with high fees too. I don't like their bicycles though, they all seem to have the inconvenient rack at the front only and nothing at the back. And you're right that parking at home is generally handled pretty well, I even know some someone who actively use 5 bicycles: - fancy racing bicycle - ebike for everyday and longer casual trips - 2 reasonable state "stationsfietsen", one for home and the nearby trainstation, the other for the frequent destination trainstation (their habit started before OV fiets became available and travel between the locations is frequent enough to not have the bicycle removed for not being used) - a "kroegfiets", pub/bar bicycle essentially an even crappier one than the regular stationsfiets for short trips while still meeting the minimum legal requirements when it comes to lights and a bell just in case they are stopped on the way home by police while riding it drunk.

[@edipires15]

You don’t necessarily have to a have Dutch address to receive a OV chipcard. I’m from Luxembourg currently studying in the Netherlands and I received my OV chipcard at my Lux. home address 2 weeks before moving in.

[@MrBaptista]

@@edipires15 well, maybe it works with Benelux addresses. Not the case for other countries addresses

[@MrBaptista]

@@extrastuff9463 It can't be sent do other European countries though. You can have a foreign IBAN. Mine worked just fine.

[@Felix54Z705]

As a germaphobe, I'm gonna pass on bike share.

[@captainchaos3667]

I think it's pretty obvious that everyone owning their own bike is superior to bike share, for many reasosn. You seem to be reasoning mostly from the point of view of a tourist to a big city, who happens to live near a bike share station at home. 😉 It's not more expensive. My bike cost € 3000,-, but it's going to last me twenty years. That's only € 12,50 a month. I'm almost 50 and have _never_ had a bike stolen; that problem gets exaggerated a lot. If you properly lock your bike it's hardly a problem. It's _much_ more convenient than having to walk to a bike share parking first, hoping that there's a (working) bike left. And then hoping it's still where you left it for the trip back. You usually can't park at your destination either with bike share bikes; you have to leave them at designated bike share parkings, which might still be hundreds of meters or more from where you're going. Even if it were more expensive, the added convenience is worth a lot. It wouldn't work as an alternative for the OV-fiets either. There are _thousands_ of OV-fietsen at big stations, can you imagine the completely impractical size of the bike share station you would need? It's only possible for OV-fietsen because you can park bicycles extremely close together by hand. Also, nobody would use it if it meant that the bike might no longer be there for the commute back to the train. Companies have tried and failed. It just doesn't make sense if a far superior system is already in place, that lets you quickly hop on a bicycle next to your own home (nobdoy parks their bicycle in their house or carries it up stairs), cycle anywhere, park in front of your destination and have the bike still be there for the trip back. The only practical use I see for it is in touristy places, for the tourists.

[@EverAfterHL]

Awesome video. If it wasn't for bikeshare in Montreal I would honestly never consider biking to places and always choose public transport, walking or cars. I hate having to drag my bike in public transit, I dont like worrying about getting my bike stolen, and just because I want to join my friend by bike, doesnt mean I want to come back by bike many hours later when we're already in another part of the city or it's late and Im tired and would rather take the metro. Honestly, bikeshare is the only reason I'm considering biking to work and places more when I move back to Montreal and I dont think Im the only one. I dont want a private car in the city because of the hassle, and it's the same with a bike, but I also like biking to places when it's conveniant so bikeshare is perfect for me really. Bikeshare is good for ordinary people who are not bike lovers by nature who wants to move around more easily without trouble or complication. It's good for big bike lovers too, but the magic of it is that it attracks more people to this mode of transportation and it's what we need.

[@myotherchannel2729]

Re girlfriend side-saddle on back of bike at 9:01 this is a very long-standing Dutch thing - I've never asked anyone but I think the issue is romance rather than a shortage of bikes!

[@FullLengthInterstates]

I think the biggest thing that negates most benefits of bike sharing is how e scooters exist. Private facilities can accommodate e scooters in ways they simply can't full size bikes, the administrator simply has to decide to allow you to walk your scooter to your cubicle. Shared vehicles have their merits in industrial settings, cultural dominance requires placing convenience ahead of efficiency.

[@michellesharpe6159]

I love using the DC CitiBike system - I've been able to do multi-day business trips without ever setting foot in a car!

[@r1n488]

I really hate scooter/bike sharing programs in suburban America, not only our infrastructure is already lame by itself, but constantly having to dodge abandoned scooters and bikes in the middle of bike paths and sidewalks is definitely no fun.

[@andrelukin6364]

I also haven't released all the benefits of using a public bike share before I tried it. It's super convenient here in NYC. Citi bike in NYC covers all my needs in the city and I don't use subway as often as before I signed up for Citi bike. I use my own foldable bike that I keep at home for longer trips outside of the city only and never worry about bike theft anymore (victim in the past)

[@jimlawton4184]

Is Bixi finally going through the winter this year? I was there last November and was disappointed not to be able to use it the whole time I was there

[@OhTheUrbanity]

Yes! It's a pilot though, centred on the St-Denis REV and a few other corridors.

[@jimlawton4184]

@@OhTheUrbanity good to hear!

[@ThomasPublicThuene]

A bike share subscription should just be a part of your Public Transport pass.

[@StartCodonUST]

Minneapolis has been so frustrating when it comes to bikeshare. There used to be a non-profit bikeshare program called Nice Ride, but even then, renting a bikeshare was $2.50 per activation and then a whopping $16/hr (charged by the minute), or $10/hr with a membership. That service never operated during the winter when it would arguably be most useful, but they never came back when spring arrived this year and the non-profit unceremoniously shut down. In its place are private scooter rideshares like Lime (and currently no bikes), which are $1 to unlock and are $23/hr, which at that point is as expensive as getting an Uber/Lyft and basically useless for nearly all trips, especially since many of the biggest trip generators in the city are off-limits to e-scooters anyway. It's confusing, opaque, and wildly overpriced.

[@PaxV]

My remark would be: No, but honestly I can see some possibilities. Shared mopeds and cycle programs do exist, however, bikes are not returned to areas but left on stupid places, succumb to vandalism, and are generally frowned upon by local residents as it's poor habit to leave a cycle unattended on sidewalks. Bikeshare or bikelease programs are best suited for middleschool and students, where general respect for the bikes is low. This would mean bikesharebikes would suffer tremendously and minor problems annoy people easily. Honestly since 35-45% of bikes are ebikes now which are set up for their riders, with guarded bikeparking available on most destinations. I'm nearing 50 and I had one bike stolen in my life. I owned 8 bikes in my life. 4 of them I used growing up (20, 24, 26, 28 inch sizes) The one stolen was a 3rd hand folding bike, For me being 6'8 and 300 pounds or 2m04 and 137 kg I prefer my personal 28" wheel, 70 and 73 cm framesize citybikes over a 'will have to do construction' molested by dozens or hundreds of previous users. My bikes (17 yr old and 1 year old) are both conventional bikes the 70cm has 7 gears, the 73cm has 8 gears, drumbrakes, bags, front and rear carriers and both are steel framed, steel rimmed tanks, with splash guards, chain guards, double standard so they do not topple when caught in wind. The shared bikes might require not much else investment, but will not provide me comfort, personal settings, personal gearing and in my case durability, as a 2,5 bar tire will mean I'll destroy the wheel rim and tire in a normal 20-25 minute trip (5 miles). I'm not normally built by any means, but I'm not an exception either.

[@michielwvdb]

Bikesharing was invented in the Netherlands in the 1960's (Wittefietsenplan). And there are still bikeshare options in the Netherlands, but they are not used as often as in other countries. Bikeshare is expensive compared to your own cheap citybike. In a city like Rotterdam you can chose between Baqme (Cargobike), Cargoroo (Cargobike) and Donkey Republic or go by scooter (way more used) with Felyx, Gosharing, Lime or Check. There have been more options but they didn't survive. All these options are a little expensive and only usefull if you have no alternatives. The OV fiets is often cheaper. By the way, a company like Donkey Republic is available in around 100 cities worldwide (4 in the Netherlands, compared to 16 in Denmark and way more in Belgium), but they have about the same number of bikes in total as there are OV fietsen in the Netherlands. The options for cargobikes are also used for carrying around kids and dogs. And finally you can take your own bike in the metro in Rotterdam outside of rush hours.

[@alankingchiu]

Bike share can be a good way for a smaller city to encourage people to start cycling. But for major cities like Montreal and Toronto, redistribution of bikes becomes very difficult and costly, and only a small subset of the population benefits from it.

[@femsff7090]

My employer pays for my OV-fiets as well as any public transportation (or €0.21 / €0.36 per km for a car) between home and work. I also have my own public transportation subscription for when I visit friends/family or something and can also use an OV-fiets then, but rarely do; usually only when I specifically go somewhere to shop and don't want to lug around my purchases on the way back and if it's a handful of shops or a farmers' market I'll be back at the station within 30 mins so the OV-fiets use is free. In addition, I have my own bicycle (and my old one, as backup) for trips to the train station, my own city or somewhere nearby (

[@Sakkura1]

You didn't really seem to cover the pollution this causes, as these bikes get left wherever (including rivers, canals, lakes, or the sea). People take better care of their own bikes. Also these businesses have a habit of going through a cycle of bankruptcies, each time leaving creditors (typically the municipality) high and dry.

[@heelgraag]

You should know that the Dutch invented bikeshare in 1965!!! just look up the wittefietsenplan by Luud Schimmelpennink. He also invented Witkar, these were smal electric cars share cars. So I would say... Been there, done that,... but got back on our own bikes. We do still have a good working bikeshare system, the owners just dont know that they are sharing their bikes 🤪

[@fietsenOveral4650]

As an American who moved from SF to Utrecht, there are moments where it seemed like it would be nice to have, but I think the majority of use cases are met here one way or another. Utrecht and Amersterdam do have dockless bikeshare (Donkey Republic in Amsterdam, Tier in Utrecht and other cities) in addition to OVFiets (my partner has unlimited access through work), as well as cargo bike share (which will soon allow one way trips). There's plenty of bikes available to rent from shops as well as Swapfiets. Not to mention if you're visiting someone there's a decent chance they have an extra bike laying around. Bikeshare in SF was a nightmare - it was a monopoly, absurdly expensive, low availability, poorly maintained. Every place I tried to use it North America it was roughly got the job done, but a similar condition. I think the concept works in theory, but most places that recently picked up bikeshare got it from one the VC-backed firms, which just don't offer much on top of the various systems already here.

[@lordsleepyhead]

Lol are you guys in the pocket of Big Bikeshare or something? Anyway, we actually do have bikeshare in the Netherlands, except it's dockless e-bikes and scooters by Go and Felyx. That seems to have caught on somewhat. Honestly, between that, OV-fiets, and almost everyone having their own bike, the market is too saturated to justify municipalities investing in bikeshare programs. Remember that municipalities have to pay for it out of our tax money, and most municipalities are already struggling financially as it stands. I don't think a proposal to start a bikeshare wouldn't make it through city hall anywhere for this reason. The question would be, "what for, what problem does it solve?" and the answer is that the number of cases where it would truly solve a problem is too small, considering all the other stuff that's available.