The Midtown Business Association in Sacramento have created a small scale bicycle share program for the Midtown Sacramento area.
The Midtown Business Assocation (MBA) is the Business Improvement District funded by the nearly 500 property owners between 16th Street and Interstate 80 / 29th Street (roughly) along J, K and L Streets. The MBA opened their first bicycle rental kiosk with 12 bicycles at 28th & J to start their modest pilot program. A second kiosk will open soon at 16th and I. Space for the two kiosks was donated by Priority Parking, which operates parking garages at those locations and, incidentally, sounds like a genius business move for them — park your car at the parking garage, then borrow a bike to get you to your destination wherever it’s at in Midtown or Downtown.
CURB Systems in Reno, NV, which normally sells software and equipment for car parking management, is getting into the bike share business and donated the software, bike rental kiosks, and other equipment. According to CURB, their intention is eventually to integrate car parking and bike rental into a single system.
Riders swipe a credit card to rent a bicycle. The first half hour is free; after that, bikes are $2 for every half hour.
More about Friday’s grand opening of Sacramento Bike Share in the Sacramento Bee.
Program organizers say they would like to add more bicycles and kiosks around Sacramento if the program is successful. In my opinion, central Sacramento between the Sacramento River, American River and I-80 is perfect for a bike share scheme like this. Some suggestions for other bike rental locations that come immediately to mind include:
- Old Sacramento.
- The Amtrak station.
- The State Capitol.
- Sutter’s Fort.
- K Street Mall.
- Sac Convention Center.
Other California cities have some kind of bike share or bike rental program.
- Bike Library in Arcata is perhaps the busiest and best known bike share in California.
- Davis as the BikeBrary.
- Green Bikes Pomona College.
- Green Bikes Pitzer College.
- Red Bikes Cal State Fresno. (Yes, red, Mr Dan Maes.)
- Triton Bikes UC San Diego.
- Zot Wheels UC Irvine.
- UC Santa Cruz Bicycle Library.
- Stanford Campus Bike Shop Rent a Bike.