generalcanada
Senior Member
the thing about the extra ebike cost, its gotta be like guaranteed ebike availability, otherwise youre still riding the manual ones anyway
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Toronto Bike Share
- Thread starter kettal
- Start date
unforgettableid
New Member
It might not be a yearly surcharge. Maybe they'll charge a small per-minute e-bike surcharge, like they do in New York City.
But then again, in Paris, France, it's a fixed surcharge. If you want e-bike access, this causes the price of your yearly membership to more than double. (Source.)
There's never a 100% guarantee of e-bike availability. If you're at a station with no e-bikes, you have two choices. You can either bike to a station that has e-bikes, or you can just use a mechanical bike instead. But, in systems which charge extra money for e-bike use, the availability of e-bikes is often quite reasonable.
Whether it's a per-minute surcharge or a yearly surcharge, I understand the basis for it, and I might indeed choose to pay it here in Toronto.
DSC
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They can never give a guarantee you will get a bike (or a dock) no matter whether it's a 'traditional' bike or an e-bike.
generalcanada
Senior Member
ya, but right now its super rare that you dont. if its like once a month you dont find an ebike then for sure id get the one for ebikes. but otherwise theres no point.
all im saying is that for the premium ebike fee to be worth it, there must be e-bikes available at least a majority of the time when looking for one
afransen
Senior Member
I wonder if they'll have a policy around letting you have an ebike for the regular rate if only ebikes are available at your dock.
I wonder if ebikes would see higher utilization and user satisfaction, to offset their higher upfront and opex cost.
I wonder if ebikes would see higher utilization and user satisfaction, to offset their higher upfront and opex cost.
kotsy
Senior Member
I'm wondering this too, especially with plans to have the fleet 20% e-bikes in the next couple years.
unforgettableid
New Member
I highly doubt any such policy will be built into the software. In fact, I'm unaware of any bike-share system, anywhere in the world, which has such a policy built into their software.
The easiest way to avoid paying the e-bike rate is to walk to another station, in order to find a mechanical bike.
Yes. I believe that, in cities which have e-bikes, the e-bikes tend to be used more times per day on average than the mechanical bikes. This suggests to me that users like the e-bikes better. (At least some of the users like them better, if not all. Specifically, I mean the users who choose to borrow the e-bikes.)
afransen
Senior Member
Does it really make sense to charge more for them, in that case? It feels like this market is not mature.
Something to be said for the slight variations on the bikeshare model similar to OVFiets, where you can rent a bike for 24h for equivalent of $5.50, but you have to return it to the location you borrowed it from. Useful for last mile at your destination transit station. Not sure one market can support multiple different bikeshare models.
Something to be said for the slight variations on the bikeshare model similar to OVFiets, where you can rent a bike for 24h for equivalent of $5.50, but you have to return it to the location you borrowed it from. Useful for last mile at your destination transit station. Not sure one market can support multiple different bikeshare models.
allengeorge
Senior Member
The per-minute surcharge in NYC has made it infeasible for delivery people to commandeer Citibike e-bikes, while allowing plenty of regular users to access them - so it’s doing it’s job. There’s also been a surge in private businesses offering e-bike and moped rentals for delivery people.
Allandale25
Senior Member
Supporting Bike Share Toronto’s Ambitious Expansion Plans — Access Planning
On August 8th, the Toronto Parking Authority’s Bike Share Toronto program, with support from Access Planning and partners Alta Planning + Design, held a public information session on the upcoming Toronto Bike Share Four-Year Growth Plan – an ambitious plan that will see the system expand with 60% mo
accessplanning.ca
Bob Loblaw
New Member
I will sheepishly confess to being a "dock-slammer". I intend to amend my practices now that I'm armed with this new information! Hopefully I haven't stressed too many bumpers! (I otherwise try to take good care of the bikes)
Great thread - thanks!
By the way, is there any way to tell at a glance if a bike (regular, non-e-bike) is going to be rubbish or not? What I mean is that some bikes are super smooth like butter and pedal beautifully, while others feel like you're towing a medium-sized boat. I've noticed that the brand new bikes (you can tell since the splash guard over the front wheel is a jet black) tend to be pretty good but occasionally you can get a dud.
Any "life hacks" on this or do you just need to check it out and take it for a test drive to be sure?
Northern Light
Superstar
Bikeshare now has a station at Lumsden/Cedarvale (just east of Woodbine) This fills in significant network gap in East York.
Source:
Source:
DSC
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I assume it is so new it has no bikes yet! Stations are great but stations without bike are not! :->
Northern Light
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unforgettableid
New Member
If the New York City system would lower the per-minute e-bike surcharge somewhat, then a few delivery people might use Citi Bike e-bikes all day and pay the surcharge. The system could then take the extra revenue and use it to buy more e-bikes. This might provide a virtuous circle of benefit for everyone.