VANCOUVER — A public bike-share system could roll out on Vancouver streets within months — more than eight years after councillors first raised the idea.

The city has signed a five-year, $5-million agreement with CycleHop Corp. Canada that could put 1,500 shared bikes on the road by the end of summer, announced Jerry Dobrovolny, the city’s general manager of engineering services, at a Tuesday council meeting.

“With this, Vancouver will have the largest smart-bike system in North America,” Dobrovolny said.

There are cities with thousands more shared bikes than Vancouver plans to have — Dobrovolny’s claim is specific to “smart-bikes,” which city staff explain as having built-in brains. While some of the 150 solar-powered stations will include a payment terminal, each smart bike will have a waterproof control box on the handlebars so riders can use smart cards or smart phones to rent them even when they are not at a station.

The bikes also feature an internal cable lock that allows users to secure them to permanent objects if docking stations are full, or to end their rental away from one.

The program’s target launch date is June 15, with 1,000 smart bikes provided by equipment vendor Smoove. Another 500 could be ready by the end of summer and, if the program is successful, it could later be expanded to a total of 2,500 bikes, Dobrovolny said.

The city will pay two-thirds of its $5-million fee when the first 1,000 bikes are ready, and it will pay the remaining balance when all 1,500 are launched. Additional costs to the city include $1 million in start-up funding for staff, signage and wayfinding expenses, and another $500,000 in annual costs.

The supplier will pay the city up to $400,000 annually for the use of city space, which Dobrovolny said would help offset some of the lost parking meter revenue. Vancouver will also receive a share of revenue per bike “over a pre-set threshold.” City staff declined to share further details on the revenue model, claiming that information could hurt CycleHop’s competitiveness in other markets.

CycleHop operates Ottawa and Gatineau’s bike share program, having replaced the city’s previous operator in 2014 after that company filed for bankruptcy protection. Staff at the National Capital Commission — which owned the bikes and stations — had been trying to sell its system since 2013, just three years after it launched. The commission had expected users to take well over one million rides a year, but in 2012 fewer than 50,000 trips were taken and the commission lost $75,000 in operating costs on top of their capital investments.

The first phase of Vancouver’s program would limit the area of operation to a relatively small section of the city. It would stretch from Main Street in the east to Arbutus in the west and north from 16th Avenue to Burrard Inlet. A second phase could broaden the zone from Macdonald Street to Commercial Drive. Docking stations would be scattered every two to three blocks throughout the operating zone, according to Dobrovolny’s report to council.