Montreal's Public Bikes To Use Web, RFID, Solar

Ian Lamont writes "Montreal is preparing to launch a Web- and RFID-enabled public bike system that allows residents and visitors to rent bicycles at special depots scattered throughout the city. Using a Web site, riders can check out a real-time inventory of available bicycles at the depot locations. At the depots, a solar-powered base station will process credit cards or member cards. The bike docks use RFID, and the system is supposedly easy to install and maintain. A pilot program will launch in September with four bike depots."

power

they should just have capacitors (or whatever) on/in the bikes that store up energy whenever brakes are used, then when the bike is returned, all the bikes all stored energy can be released back onto the grid, perhaps which could then be transfered as credit or whatever and give a discount for renting the bike.

heck, maybe if u ride enough you could make money by way of power generation

yes thats all probably ridiculous, but it's 3am so idfc lol

Re:

that is a pretty good idea but it seems like a real long extension cord might be better (and it is only 1 am here =p)

Re:power

KISS and Keep It Cheap.

Some of the biggest issues with public bikes is vandalism, people not returning the bikes or plain old carelessny. Attaching some probably expensive power generrator thingie to the bikes? Bad idea. At a time it was so bad here, they considered making it members only. Not that membership involved much more than basicly getting your personal card, but it'd ruin the use for tourists and such. In the end we didn't have to, but you call tell by the bike type what it's all about. Cheap, sturdy bike with no gears designed for moving in the flat city only, it's as stripped as it gets.

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they should just have capacitors (or whatever) on/in the bikes that store up energy whenever brakes are used

Great idea! We just need figure out how the "or whatever" is going to work.

heck, maybe if u ride enough you could make money by way of power generation

maybe

yes thats all probably ridiculous, but it's 3am so idfc lol

totally

They only get a few months..

I'm just guessing, but the bicycle may not be the best means of transportation in the winter, particularly in Montreal.

Re:They only get a few months..

Not for too long with global warming!

Re:They only get a few months..

There is not much snow in Montreal until end of December and not much after end of March, so, bicycles are usable nine months a year. Do let be confuse, Montreal is still far from Iqaluit.

Re:They only get a few months..

the bicycle may not be the best means of transportation in the winter, particularly in Montreal.

I know it's Canada, but they do shovel the streets... particularly downtown

They do indeed shovel the streets here, they shovel all the streets, but it still remains extremely slippery. It's quite a dangerous endeavour to ride bike in Wintertime, and only bike nuts and downtown bicycle couriers do it. Your wheels may suddenly just jerk sideways and completely slip away from under you, slamming you in the ground.

Besides, dangerous or not, riding a bike by minus 10, minus 20 is just very damn uncomfortable. At these temperatures, you already need to dress up considerably just to step outside. To ride a bike, you need double the insulation because of the wind, especially on your face and hands. And pedalling with winter boots on just isn't fun.

So, no. Montrealers in general don't bike in the Winter.

Limited Mobility Users?

From the Feature List:

Easy access for people with limited mobility.

But... it's a bicycle that they get. What are people with limited mobility going to do with the bicycle?

Re:Limited Mobility Users?

> What are people with limited mobility going to do with the bicycle?

"Limited mobility" doesn't mean "completely immobile". I, for example, have some orthopedic problems that make it really painful to walk further than about a mile or stand on my feet for more than an hour at a time. A bicycle would greatly extend my range by taking most of the strain off my feet.

(Of course, I don't really have anywhere to store one, and the hills around here are bastards, but that's a whole other subject...)

Re:Limited Mobility Users?

it's also possible the bicycles could be the three wheeled variety. I see them around these parts from time to time for people that can't stand for long periods of time. Usually a large basket on the front too so they can do minor shopping etc.

I was also very surprised to see TWO bikes in the last month being ridden by paraplegics. (no legs) The bikes look a bit like recumbents in that their seat is very close to the ground. The energy is supplied by a cam system on the handlebars, which moves back and forth in addition to twisting for steering. The forward and backward motion moves the bike. Those two had some serious muscle in their arms, and could easily keep pace with others. Beats the heck out of a wheelchair and is an uplifting sight to see on the bicycle trails.

Seems to work in Sweden...

We have had this [wikipedia.org] in sweden for a while now. It seems to be pretty successful. I have not used it, as i have my own bike, but i see a lot of people ridnig around on them.
 

Re:Seems to work in Sweden...

Got them in Oslo, Norway [oslobysykkel.no] too.

I use them all the time, they make getting around town so easy.

• You dont need to worry about locking up your own bike.
• You dont need to get back to a specific spot to pick your own bike.
• You are not forced to go both ways by bike. You can cycle to town, the get a tram, tube, taxi etc home later if you want to.
• You dont spend 20mins trying to find parking for your car
• You dont spend 10mins waiting for a tram
• You can go directions where public transport might not go directly
• It only costs 70kr/year which is about $14 as the bikes and bikesheds are sponsored with ads.

The system here also has a realtime website with status of their 90ish depots/bikesheds. And if the one you are at is empty, then the screen lists the status of nearby depots.

There are some drawbacks with the free city bikes:

• It is too popular, often the bike rails are empty
• People tend to go the same directions/places at the same time. So even with trucks driving around to redistribute the bikes, the ones on the city centre limits are during day time often empty and the ones in the centre are full.
• Even with constant maintenance some of the bikes have taken a beating
• Some people steal the free city bikes. Makes no sense to me, as they are virtually free.

So I fully recommend them, it has made us get about town so much easier and quicker (and thus more often), but they are only useful if the depots are everywhere and stocked up.

Before you dismiss it....

Have you seen how successful the public bicycle system is in Paris? It's a generation older in terms of tech, but it continues to be a great success. Being able to simply grab (rent) a bike and ride the 15-20 blocks you might need to travel, doing this above ground in a physically exhilarating and liberating fashion (compared to a bus/metro/taxi)... this is all most excellent.

The geek criticism of this technology for its "privacy concerns" and for its "technological weak points" is probably all logically sound. But the very same people who are making these points are also very likely the most keyboard-bound (by habit) people. They are perhaps failing to see the practical gains here, in favor of racing to point out academic faults. To them I say:

Dude! If ever anyone needed a digital rent-a-bike to get you off your ass, it's you! Who do you think they are making this for? It's not the carousing moron with bad credit and too many kids. It's not Dr. MD-PhD who drives to his practice to check his schedule for next week. It's you, pal.

Re:Before you dismiss it....

It will be the 1 year anniversary of the Velib system in Paris in a few weeks time.
I was looking at the figures the other day - there are over 20,000 bikes now [100% more than when launched] - and 1,450 stations.

It seems to be a very mixed demographic that uses them - you'll see a lot of students, and a lot of older folk as well.
From my point of view, there definitely seem to be less tourists using them - it may catch on though.

The system, however, is fantastic. Most people over here don't have enough space to have their own bike, and being able to grab one to ride to a friend's house, or shorten a walk home, or simply take advantage of a sunny day, for 1 Euro - fantastic.

And, summer brings girls in sundresses onto bicycles!

Re:mmmmmk

I mean they're not going to put sensors everywhere in the city to track them everywhere but I bet they could sell the data of routes people take and sell the stats to businesses. That or follow "suspicious" people who haven't even committed a crime.

I mean, nobody who is about to commit a crime is going to make sure they aren't traced by stealing a bike or maybe using a false credit card or possibly thinking for three seconds before they commit the crime.

If it's a rental vehicle, it's no different from a taxi.

You can bet they will be tracking everyone with it, but so what?

Re:mmmmmk

The thing about this tracking however, is that it's opt-in. If you don't like them knowing where you'll be taking their bike, don't rent one and get on the bus instead. Far less personal information traded with the bus, especially if you pay per ride in cash. But having other people using the bikes is just fine for the bus goers. It means the buses will be potentially less crowded.

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lol.

And then the terrorists suicide bombs the bus all they will do is to bomb themselves! Omg the precious virgins!

Re:mmmmmk

I think they're most interested in tracking the bikes themselves so they don't get stolen.

Re:mmmmmk

So you want a public bike rental system which doesn't keep records? Good luck with that.

Re:mmmmmk

There must be some system implemented for preventing the bikes from getting stolen. We have a similar system in Vienna, Austria; when it first started off a couple of years back, the bikes were chained onto bicycle racks and could be unlocked like a shopping trolley with a 2 Euro coin (which would be refunded as soon as the bike was returned to a rack again). However within a couple of weeks virtually all bikes had been stolen and sold in other countries. The system was later reimplemented using credit card verification, and now works quite successfully.

I'm sure the people in charge of this project in Montreal would have looked at examples from other cities where these systems already exist, and deemed this sort of protection necessary, there's no need to get all worked up about it being some huge conspiracy to track citizens around the city, after all, it's mostly used by people enjoying a quiet stroll around the city on a nice day, I doubt much confidential information can be extracted by tracking bikes driving through parks.

Re:

A similar system has been in place in Barcelona for a couple of years now, it's called bicing [bicing.com].
The system doesn't explicitly track the bikes, but knows on which station is each bike, or if it is in use, which user has it.
The most you could get is a database of points between which each user moves. For example, I mostly move between two stations: one next to the train station and one next to my working place.
The linking between the bike and the user is to enforce a maximum time of use, after which an ec

Re:mmmmmk

I know! Next they'll make us put unique identifiers on our cars that can be automatically read from a distance! Where will the madness end?!?

Re:

"Tracked" by RFID? Do you know anything about RFID? It sucks balls for tracking things, especially outdoors... TFA suggests (quite logically) that the RFID only detects if the bike is in the rack. I swear, libertarians see RFID and they assume it's already measuring their heartbeat or reading their mind...

Re:

"Tracked" by RFID? Do you know anything about RFID? It sucks balls for tracking things, especially outdoors... TFA suggests (quite logically) that the RFID only detects if the bike is in the rack. I swear, libertarians see RFID and they assume it's already measuring their heartbeat or reading their mind...

A couple points...

First, the article claims that the technology will be used to help monitor traffic usage. One could assume that this was merely at the docking stations, but it could be used outside