There are 2000 bikes and 150 stations across inner Brisbane as part of the CityCycle scheme. Why has CityCycle outlived similar schemes in other Australian capital cities? Bike-hire schemes have come and gone from other capital cities. Public and Active Transport chairman Adrian Schrinner said a change in sign-up options increased usage. Credit:Ruth McCosker Singaporean company Obike pulled the plug on its Melbourne service in June while Australian-owned company ReddyGo left Sydney in July.

University of Queensland professor in human geography Jonathan Corcoran said dockless bike-share schemes, such as ReddyGo and Obike, are prone to vandalism and being strewn around the place, which created the public perception that the bikes littered public space. “It has demonstrated the world is perhaps not quite ready for dockless stations,” he said. The council’s public and active transport chairman Adrian Schrinner said dockless schemes were explored as an option for Brisbane but were not pursued for several reasons, including some business models including selling on user’s data. ”[Docked bikes] are certainly a more orderly scheme,” Cr Schrinner said. “People will know where stations are, the bikes are lined up in an orderly fashion, they are not getting vandalised like they were in some cities that had the dockless bikes.”

Dockless bike-share scheme Mobike began operating on the Gold Coast in early 2018. What is the reason for CityCycle’s recent growth? Dr Corcoran said the key to a successful bike share scheme was the bikes being in the right location and having a good system for people to access them. Cr Schrinner said a change to the memberships as well as the visibility of the bikes contributed to the recent increase in usage.

“It’s now a more streamlined process [to hire a bike], you can tap and go at the machine,” he said. “CityCycle is also now more visible around the city as more people use it. “That in itself drives more people to give it a go.” Will CityCycle ever be economical? After operating for seven years the bike scheme had cost ratepayers almost $13 million.

From its launch to June 30, 2017, CityCycle cost, in total, about $27.6 million and generated about $14.7 million, leaving the scheme $12.85 million in the red. Council budgeted net expenses of $472,000 for its CityCycle partnership in the 2018-19 budget. Cr Schrinner said making a profit was not the fundamental reason for bringing a bike-share scheme to Brisbane. “It’s essentially a public service,” he said. “Obviously the cost of providing it is subsidised in part by the advertising JCDecaux does and that helps keep the cost down.

“Our aim with this is to actually have a more active and healthy Brisbane to help reduce traffic congestion, not to make a profit.” What does the future of CityCycle look like? Dr Corcoran called for more data to be collected about the existing scheme. “There is still more untapped potential there,” he said. “It’s trying to understand what are those barriers. Is it that we could do a little bit better in terms of protected bikeways ... or is it something to do with the sign-up scheme that could be improved again.

“Answering those sort of questions and also getting some GPS traces, how do people use these bikes? What routes do they use around Brisbane and can we use that information to upgrade some spaces. Loading Dr Corcoran said suburban trials of the scheme would be useful, including connecting homes to key transport hubs. “It would be an interesting case to test,” he said. “The critical thing to its expansion would be to ensure it links to the existing core rather than starting up a little satellite.”