

London's bicycle-hire scheme

Grit in the gears

Early snags for the mayor of London’s pet transport project

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Readers' comments


Duncan Smith

While the cycle hire scheme has several shortcomings this article is unduly negative in its summary of the prospects for more cycling in London.

Firstly the idea that central London is 'dominated by cars' is false- the majority of trips are carried out on foot or by public transport. The main 'path dependence' issue for central London is that it has inherited a medieval/Georgian/Victorian street network leading to extreme congestion for space inefficient private vehicles. More cycle trips would certainly has space benefits over cars, in addition to environmental benefits.

Barriers to more cycling include safety, lack of segregated lanes, bike security, lack of lock up facilities, poor integration with public transport, and perceptions of cycling not being a respectable means of travel by professional workers or indeed by many motorists. The bike hire scheme is helping to address many of these issues.

Yes the cycling superhighways are poor. Achieving better cycle space would not require 'demolishing buildings' but it would require reducing road space to cars and a good deal more ambition than the superhighways scheme.


In Montreal, the introduction of a bicycle-hire scheme was implemented at the same time as the introduction of kerb-separated bicycle lanes. Racks were placed at very convenient locations, and the result is a very useable, very popular system.


London is without doubt the worst city for cycling that I have experienced. It is however safer for cyclists - by some margin - than many 'quiet' country roads and lanes in rural Britain.

Mr Fogg

With the tragic death of boxer Gary Moore on London's streets today do we need more evidence that 20 stone of man and machine is no contender against two tonnes of metal. The news reports did not mention if he wearing a helmet--that final fall of two meters or more to concrete curbs and hard tarmac can take out any champion.
We have subsidized the throughways, lard-arsed drivers and their energy wasting vehicles abundantly since Mr Toad deserted his gypsy caravan for a motorcar. Perhaps now is the time to abandon the petrol pariahs and put our money into cycling infrastructure. The savings to public health systems should well finance the costs.


I find myself bemused by this whole bike-rental scheme, as I am with many British social experiments. But then, I left central London 10 years ago for the (supposedly car-friendly) pastures of California.

I completely understand the value of offering on-demand bike rentals at long distance mass transit hubs, that are otherwise poorly connected with local transit services. If the rental sites were at train stations outside of the city center, where there was no Tube service, then commuters to those stations would feel more comfortable taking trains, knowing that they would have the means to reach their destination.

But all the TfL locations are in central London (see map: http://bit.ly/euTjnJ ), an area that is already serviced by a comprehensive network of underground trains and buses (and taxis for those occasional odd journeys). There's really nowhere in central London that you *need* a bike to get to, that you could not otherwise reach using the Tube/bus and a short walk. The existing Tube/bus services may be crowded and poorly-run (I can't say for sure, since I haven't lived in London for 10 years), but if that were the problem, then surely the solution is to make the existing network more efficient; not add a bike-rental scheme.

This article also claims that the rental locations were intentionally placed away from train stations so that the people who would find them most useful (long distance commuters) would avoid using them. Does that only sound loony to me? Surely a cheaper and smarter approach would be to encourage/require the train services that terminate in London to offer bicycle transport.

In the San Francisco Bay Area where I live, the Caltrain service has a dedicated bike car. People can ride their bike to the station, load it on the train, and ride it to their destination at the other end. Alternatively (in car-dominated California) some stations also offer long-term bike lockers. Riders can leave their bike safely locked inside a self-service locker at the terminal of their journey that they need a bicycle at.

Jim Jones

I think this overlooks the cultural impact the scheme has. Never would I have thought have thought about biking around London. However, the bike scheme gave me a taste of it and now I'm hooked. Unfortunately there are no docking points near my house and were impractical in other ways (frequently finding empty docking stations being one of them), so I just bought myself my own bike.

I really hope these mark the beginning of a cycling revolution within London.


As an early adopter and regular user of the scheme, I would like to make some comments and observations.

At the outset, it might be useful to know that:

1. During rush hour I am a member of the 'after-rail' market. I am grateful to the Serco team who ferry the bikes around to meet morning demand at Waterloo;

2. During the day I use the bikes to travel to certain meetings and lunches (if I am attending on my own);

3. I am a confident cyclist and I consider myself a competent cyclist in central London; and

4. I pre-registered to ensure I was invited to join the scheme a week before launch, and I have been riding since the day the scheme commenced. I do not ride in the heavy rain but I do ride in overcast conditions. I did make some careful trips during the December 2010 snow.


Happily, instances of inconvenience to me have been very few. Instances of material inconvenience to me have been non-existent.

I am very enthusiastic about the scheme and it gives me a number of benefits including:

1. A faster, more pleasant, City commute than I get from the Tube;

2. Active thinking time; and

3. Between 30 and 40 minutes exercise each day that I ride (fully suited and booted in both summer and winter).

To join and be a responsible member of the scheme, however, you must be confident and prepared to play a sensible role on the road. To me, among other things this means approaching turns and junctions carefully (and confidently) but otherwise yielding to faster / motorised traffic.


My personal experience to date is that cycling in central London is not to be feared. It must be respected, of course. User experience could be improved with educational exercises (eg: assisted commutes for cyclists, as occur on Tube strike days, along with the usual web-based educational materials).


For my part, the inconvenience of cycling in central London that existed prior to the scheme was that of taking your bike with you on the train. I never did it. I live 13 miles from work and so a daily commute was not practical (facilities; family life).

Two potential alternative (but complementary) schemes that might be explored - and may well have been explored during the planning phase of the current scheme, of course - include:

POTENTIAL COMPLEMENTARY ALTERNATIVE 1 - Secure lockers at either end of the most popular 'after-rail' cycle routes. I would then purchase a cheap bike to keep in central London. The lockers could operate with the same key as that for the current scheme, and could be monitored electronically - the infrastructure already exists. For example an e-mail / phone chaser could be sent if the locker remains unused (but occupied) for more than 2 days. Clearly the ability to plan your vacations / absences on line will be a key part of such a scheme, as would be a central transfer / disposal / recycling point for unclaimed / over-staying cycles. A contractor such as Serco could operate this in conjunction with their current workload.

Because I would then be free to occupy a locker as I wished, I would pay more for this service than the £45 per year annual fee for the current scheme (albeit that the fee for the current will only go upwards in future, I suspect). The system would have to ensure that only my key opened the locker that my cycle was occupying at the time.

POTENTIAL COMPLEMENTARY ALTERNATIVE 2 - Allow private cycles to use the docking points. Again, a higher fee would be charged and a similar monitoring system would be required. The physical dimensions of the docking points would have to be released and / or an appropriate frame design released to enable private users to affix (weld / other secure mechanism) the locking triangle / chip to their cycle. Clearly the City could take no more responsibility for the security of the cycles than if a user had his or her own locks and locked the cycle on the street.

Of course, this is not dissimilar to simply leaving a cycle locked on the street. However there is a higher degree of monitoring at the docking points and, hence, ostensible deterrent to theft and vandalism.

Both of these schemes would require additional space for either more docking points or the new physical locker systems. However with a year or two's usage data, the additional physical infrastructure required could be finely targeted.

I also suspect that they would be a cheaper option than the current scheme to the extent that the user provides his or her own cycle (and / or could purchase one).

Unfortunately I do not see a significant change to the environment as regards cycle paths. I do not see it as a primary focus for the short or medium term.


As far as I know, all cities in the western world with high bicycle use, all have segregated bicycle lanes and some sort of priority at junctions. Alas, the road traffic regulations and design only provide for this in primarily three countries, Denmark, the Netherlands and Germany. Sadly, as long as other countries refuse to learn from these countries and copy their regulation and design, I cannot see that bicycle use in countries such as France, Spain and the UK will ever cater for more than a very small percentage of daily journeys.


There is ABSOLUTELY no need to demolish buildings in order to allocate roadspace to cycling. On London's road network an average 50% of people are driving 2 miles OR LESS, a distance that can easily be cycled and probably walked. The Cycle Superhighways did not reallocate roadway space to cycling, so the 50% of people driving 2 miles or less, who are clearly used to their congestion, had no reason to start cycling.


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