Hi, We've just had a new service installed here in Montreal (bixi), created in partnership with bike builder DeVinci. The system was carefully designed after looking at what other cities implemented, mainly in Europe. Here's a few notes on how it works.
The bikes are connected to a solar-powered station, and it requires a subscription to activate any bike. Once subscribed, you enter your chip-keycard into the station, and the bike is released. Each trip is required to be of 30 minutes or less, unless you will be billed on the credit card related to the subscription. Additional 30 minutes are $1.50 CDN. Each station has 5 to 30 bikes, depending on location. Most stations are located in the denser area of central Montreal, and are each about 200-500 meters appart, sometimes even closer. Each station can "tell" you what is the nearest station with a free spot to land a bike if you can't dock into a full station. Right now, this feature is not yet activated, however it should be online soon (the service has been set up only 45 days ago). The website features a google map custom map with all the infos in realtime (how many bikes available at each station, how many free spots, etc). You can also access it using an iPhone or smartphone, or can call if you have trouble landing a bike after your errand. The bike is really sturdy, yet pleasing to drive. I work over the repair shop and after a quick chat with the guys in charge of the maintenance, the bikes have shown some troubles ranging from small adjustments to complete vandalism. The number of repairs is a bit higher than forecasted, but not that much. After using the bikes, I can personnaly say that most of them are not in perfect shapes (glitch with shifters, fenders a bit bent, etc) but most are ridable. Finally, a few nice things about the design of it all: The bikes are a good example of integrated design for a city bike: for example, red led lights are integrated in the chain stays, and the gear system and dynamo are all conveniently hidden into the rear hub. It makes a harder to destroy bike, but it's also a lesson into integrated design for everyday bicycle. The station's interface is quite simple, with a simple button to add time in case you can't land a bike because the current station is full, and a simple "repair" button to signal your bike as needing repairs after it is docked. However, the single day use of a bike using a credit card for non-members is not very user-friendly, as you must: - Read 70 pages of conditions on a small 5 by 5 inches screen on the station (must people don't) - Insert your credit card - Remember a five digits code that you must enter on the docking anchor of a bike to free it (you can print a ticket to remember the code, which is a sequence of 5 digits from 1 to 3). - Once you land a bike and want to take another one, you must re-insert your credit card, so the station can issue you a new code. It's probably needed to gather stats on your trip, and ensure the 24h max period. Most people try to enter the same code from the previous station, and end up calling tech support. One must really read all the instructions on the station to really understand this part...! Hope this helps! :) Simon . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Posted from the new ixda.org http://www.ixda.org/discuss?post=43428 ________________________________________________________________ Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ....... [email protected] Unsubscribe ................ http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines ............ http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .................. http://www.ixda.org/help
