Biking in Boston

Hold on a sec, I think I have the photo of the biker riding on the sidewalk ...
 
Sidewalk riding is legal in most of Boston, Cambridge etc.
 
The official Boston and Cambridge literature lists sidewalk riding as "permitted, except in business districts." ...which is most of the city.
 
I believe the exact term is "thickly settled business district".

Would you consider Roxbury a thickly settled business district? Brighton?
 
Alright, alright, I was just being dickish. He obviously had had it fixed somewhere or was going to get it fixed and was only doing it out of necessity and he obeyed all traffic laws and he seemed overly cautious.

-30-
 
jass said:
I believe the exact term is "thickly settled business district".

Would you consider Roxbury a thickly settled business district? Brighton?
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That's the problem. Where the heck is the line?
 
nobody said:
I'll make a prediction here, in the next year it's likely Chicago and San Fran will award contracts. If B-cycle can't win either of those (or some other 75 station plus system I'm not thinking of) they will go out of business.
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B-cycle has won Baltimore. Will start at 30 stations, 250 bikes.

Baltimore was highly interested in the GPS feature of bikes, which B-cycle promotes, and Bixi does not. That was written into the RFP , and so, B-cycle was able to meet that requirement quite easily.

I guess the GPS feature trumped the DC factor (ie, a huge Bixi system being in the same metro area). To be honest, I thought Bixi would win because of that....but Bixi's lack of cross system membership compatibility probably hurt.
 
According to their facebook page, Hubway stations are being removed for winter starting November 21st and will return March 1st. The removal will happen over a ten day period.

This is a change of policy.

Originally, Hubway had said the removal would be weather dependent (ie snow) and the return would be as well.

Because the stations are mostly in the roadway, plows are an issue. But if it doesnt snow (plowable amounts) until January, as is usually the case in Boston, then the removal makes no sense.

I dont understand why they've gone from "snow dates" to "hard dates"

As far as staffing is concerned, ski resorts have no problem adjusting their dates based on weather.


As for the removal schedule, it's also a bad idea. They say they will remove the stations from least used to most used in order over 10 days.

....but thats now how a bike share network works. Customers will be screwed over and angry when they check out a bike at a popular station, bike to their usual station, and find out it's gone.

The best way would have been to close the system all at once for the season, an remove them over 3-4 days.
 
I agree they should remove them all at once. Even if it takes a few days, just shut the system down so nobody can take them out.

Also, it may be better to get the out now instead of the first snow. As you said, plows could pose a threat to the bikes. So if they don't have enough warning to get all the stations removed, it could get ugly. Or they might get buried for months.
 
BostonUrbEx said:
I agree they should remove them all at once. Even if it takes a few days, just shut the system down so nobody can take them out.

Also, it may be better to get the out now instead of the first snow. As you said, plows could pose a threat to the bikes. So if they don't have enough warning to get all the stations removed, it could get ugly. Or they might get buried for months.
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The arrival of a storm is pretty predictable. Quantity of snow? Not at all. But general storm movement, yes.

It shouldnt take more than 5 days to remove all 60 stations (the 61st was never installed). Generally, major weather events are observable 10 days in advance. I will put down large sums of money that there will be no plowable snow before November 22nd.

There is a good chance of a false positive, but a false positive is better than removing it just because.


One thing I still dont understand is why Boston wanted every station in the street. The big issue are the snow plows. If the majority of stations were located in plazas, parks, wide sidewalks, squares, etc, it would be a non-issue.
 
jass said:
The arrival of a storm is pretty predictable. Quantity of snow? Not at all. But general storm movement, yes.

It shouldnt take more than 5 days to remove all 60 stations (the 61st was never installed). Generally, major weather events are observable 10 days in advance. I will put down large sums of money that there will be no plowable snow before November 22nd.

There is a good chance of a false positive, but a false positive is better than removing it just because.


One thing I still dont understand is why Boston wanted every station in the street. The big issue are the snow plows. If the majority of stations were located in plazas, parks, wide sidewalks, squares, etc, it would be a non-issue.
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At least one is, the Prudential. It is a liability though if the property owner and city can't come to an agreement.
 
jass said:
B-cycle has won Baltimore. Will start at 30 stations, 250 bikes.

Baltimore was highly interested in the GPS feature of bikes, which B-cycle promotes, and Bixi does not. That was written into the RFP , and so, B-cycle was able to meet that requirement quite easily.

I guess the GPS feature trumped the DC factor (ie, a huge Bixi system being in the same metro area). To be honest, I thought Bixi would win because of that....but Bixi's lack of cross system membership compatibility probably hurt.
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That's good for b-cycle. Lets keep 30 station systems in perspective though. I mean in the next 12 months Capital Bike Share is adding something like 80 stations in DC and 50 in Arlington. Plus you are likely to see Hubway to add 20 stations in Cambridge and a few more in Brookline/Somerville next year.

And London is adding 2,000 bikes in the spring as they expand to new parts of town. And of course there is NYC.

I'm interested in how you come to the conclusion that the GPS played a factor? In this article
http://www.baltimorebrew.com/2011/1...vived-300-bike-network-possible-by-next-fall/

It says they'll launch next September in Baltimore. Between now and next September Alta/Bixi are to launch Chattanooga and NYC, both of those systems are supposed to have GPS. So how is it that you reach the conclusion that Baltimore chose B-cycle on the basis of Bixi not having GPS?

On another topic. How do you feel about that timeline? 10 months from being awarded the contract to the actual launch? I actually think it's pretty reasonable.

If you have the contacts within the industry you should dig a little deeper and see why Baltimore went with B-Cycle. I can tell you though that Alta/Bixi were out of the running a long time ago, mainly because of the financials of the deal.

You should keep track of those financial issues as well. B-Cycle has to raise 1.2 million to pay themselves for the stations and the beginning of operations. It will be interesting to see if in the end they get to 1.2 million or if they have to eat much of the cost by giving the stations away for less than they want to.
 
jass said:
According to their facebook page, Hubway stations are being removed for winter starting November 21st and will return March 1st. The removal will happen over a ten day period.

This is a change of policy.

Originally, Hubway had said the removal would be weather dependent (ie snow) and the return would be as well.

Because the stations are mostly in the roadway, plows are an issue. But if it doesnt snow (plowable amounts) until January, as is usually the case in Boston, then the removal makes no sense.

I dont understand why they've gone from "snow dates" to "hard dates"

As far as staffing is concerned, ski resorts have no problem adjusting their dates based on weather.


As for the removal schedule, it's also a bad idea. They say they will remove the stations from least used to most used in order over 10 days.

....but thats now how a bike share network works. Customers will be screwed over and angry when they check out a bike at a popular station, bike to their usual station, and find out it's gone.

The best way would have been to close the system all at once for the season, an remove them over 3-4 days.
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Jass, let me break it down for you and explain why you are off base here.

First, this "This is a change of policy. " Here is the language from the actual user agreement each user agrees to when they sign up. It's easily found on the join page of the website.
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Alta makes every effort to provide the Service from March through November, but does not guarantee that the Service will be available at all times, as force majeure events or other circumstances might prevent Alta from providing the Service.
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So there it is, March through November. Those are the dates. The weather dates as you call them were likely being referenced so that people were aware the system could come offline sooner than Nov 31st. I'm sure early on people with the city especially had these visions of thousands of people braving the winter cold to ride, but once they saw the operations costs vs the ridership/revenue projections they pretty quickly realized having the system online in Dec/Jan was not a good option for them.

Have you ever been involved with the depolyment of one of these systems? Removing 60 stations in 3-4 days would be a terrible idea because you'd incure huge costs uncessarily.

To remove/drop a station you need a crane truck, a flatbed and at least 4 staff. On a perfect day one team could do 6 stations. So to do all 60 in 3 days you'd need 3+ teams of crew + trucks.

And when I say a perfect day I mean nothing goes wrong at all, the trucks don't get stuck in traffic, you don't have to wait for the cops to show up to oversee your operation, and there aren't any parked cars in the spots where you've placed no parking signs. Any of these things could easily cost you an hour plus and blow your whole schedule.

Now, how many trucks do you think Alta has at hand? Why would they keep 4 crain trucks on hand, what would those trucks do all year? I'm guessing Alta has a single crain truck and they rent another truck when they need to. So in order to remove all 60 in 3 days Alta would have to rent a minimum of 3 more trucks, with certified crane operators, 3 flatbeds and have another 12 people working with those 3 extra crews. You add all those things up and you are talking easily over 5 figures a day in 'extra' costs.

Or you use the 1 truck you own, and the 4 staff you already have and you do it over 12-14 days and you incur zero extra costs. Remember, the city and Alta benefit from lower operational costs, nobody wants to spend money unecessarily.

Plus, I'd imagine the city/alta have looked at the numbers and they know which stations and station pairs are getting the bulk of the trips and which are seeing no more than 2-4 trips a day. In systems like this, especially at this time of year, I would estimate that 80% of the trips begin/end at a subset of the stations that is less than a 3rd of the whole network.

As I'm sure you are well aware, the city gets what the city wants. If they city wanted those stations on the ground they would be on the ground. They've done the analysis and they know what is prudent and they are going to implement that plan. I guess with all your experience in bike sharing and insight into the innerworkings of Hubway that you know what's best though.
 
I question the open by March 1 -- that is more likely to be a snow day than any day in early December

In Boston as opposed to the suburbs north and west -- the operations should be March 15 -- Dec 15

In Lexington the police will ticket cars parking overnight from Dec 1 through March 31
 
Took my first Hubway ride yesterday, from Tremont and Berkeley streets over to Chinatown, over to Fort Point Channel, down through South Boston along the South Bay Trail (!) up Melnea Cass Boulevard through Madison Park to Dudley Square.

Two hours. Fun.
 
Wouldn't it be easier to pull all the bikes at once overnight, and leave the kiosks with a closed for the season message, as the kiosks themselves are removed over the course of several days?
 
nobody, I shall reply to you in full either tomorrow or wednesday, when I have time.

Just wanted to advise forumers of the following:


Mayor Menino's Boston Bikes says:
Where do you want the city to put in bike lanes?

Come to the city of Boston's 2nd Bike Network Open House. Review the draft network plan and vision and tell us your thoughts.

November 16th at the BPL, 700 Boylston Street from 5:30-8:30, Lower Level, McKim A. Questions: 617 619 9910.
 
jass said:
I guess the GPS feature trumped the DC factor (ie, a huge Bixi system being in the same metro area). To be honest, I thought Bixi would win because of that....but Bixi's lack of cross system membership compatibility probably hurt.
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In my experience, despite DC and Baltimore being in the same CSA (though separate MSAs), the two don't share a lot on the day-to-day level. I.e. I've met more than one person who lives in DC and has never been to Baltimore or can go years without visiting. I imagine, however, the inverse is less common. I guess, in a way, it's akin to me having never been to Worcester. Living in Boston, I'd never have a reason to go. Arguably, the only thing that Baltimore has over DC is the aquarium.

I'd like to think they might have looked into how many people might commute from one city to the other and might like to use a bike for at least part of their commute. But, I can also easily see how they might not have. Civic pride and not wanting to become even more of a second fiddle in the region than it already does may have played a role. It's hard not to let optics sway political decisions. Either way, it's not terribly surprising to me that commonality between DC and Baltimore might not have weighed heavily on "Bawlimer's" decision not to go with Bixi.
 
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