I actually have been pushing - OK, not all that hard, but making suggestions on a regular basis - for pay-by-hour bike lockers in downtown Madison. It would be great to be able to leave my bike and panniers in a locker while I go to dinner, finish shopping, see a concert, walk around, or otherwise want to be unburdened by large bulky bags.
My commuter bike is nothing anyone would want to steal, but I'm sure many people have very nice bikes that they would ride downtown more often if they knew they'd be able to truly secure the bike and all its components. Nice seat, nice wheels, a high-end light, or even the entire bike are all targets for thieves. Not only are there not enough bike lockers downtown - almost zero, to be honest - but not everyone wants or needs a locker every day. We would like to be able to rent the lockers as needed. There are coin- and credit card-operated lockers in places all over the US that are large enough for luggage. These days many don't have keys, but operate with a numbered keypad. There are also many bike locker companies that can craft arrays of lockers to fit any space. We just need to put the hourly technology on the bike lockers! Of course, we'd also need a place to put the lockers. Perhaps a few car-parking spaces in the ramps could be converted to bike parking. I once checked with the City Attorney's office and was told that there is no legal restrictions on the bonds (which are actually paid off, so the restrictions are no longer in place, but might come back with new debt) that only motor vehicles can be parked in the ramps. All vehicles must PAY, but nothing says that each individual spot must be self-supporting. As a matter of fact, for years the metered street spaces subsidized the ramps. And everyone knows that that last lonely car spot on the top floor would never pay for itself anyway. Just take a few spots and make them bike parking. (Note that I am cc'ing the downtown and bike-riding alders on this, just in case one of them would like to take this up.) Robbie Webber Transportation Policy Analyst State Smart Transportation Initiative www.ssti.us 608-263-9984 (o) 608-225-0002 (c) [email protected] On Wed, Jul 3, 2013 at 8:42 AM, S. Morris Rose <[email protected]> wrote: > Here's a technology I've never seen deployed before: > > > http://metro.kingcounty.gov/tops/bike/parking/index.html#on-demand-elockers > > (This is in Seattle- that's a minor city near Tacoma that doesn't even > have a single professional basketball team.) > > The basic idea is that you can rent one of these bike lockers by the hour > using a single-purpose credit card sized wallet. Users pay a nickel an hour > for time they reserve at the time of rental and twelve cents an hour for > overtime. The cards start with $20 of value, which is 400 hours of reserved > time, and can be reloaded in various ways. Seems well thought out and > affordable, though it would be nice to be able to use the card for other > stuff, or use other stuff (NFC cell phone?) to use the system. One issue is > that users can't know in advance if a slot will be available, so need a > plan B. > > It will be interesting to see if this succeeds. If so, I would guess that > it will eventually be possible to check and reserve space online to solve > the Plan B problem, use other devices to transact, and use them as budget > love hotels. > > -- > Scott M. Rose > West Point Grey, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada > > _______________________________________________ > Bikies mailing list > [email protected] > http://lists.danenet.org/listinfo.cgi/bikies-danenet.org > >
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