This is sweet. An excellent compilation of existing, planned, or under construction bike-sharing programs around the world. It was put together by the bike-sharing-obsessed people over at the The Bike-sharing Blog, which is a product of Paul DeMaio / MetroBike, LLC and Russell Meddin. The map includes 2nd- and 3rd-generation bike-sharing programs (sorry, 1st-generationers). Check out the map, and jump down below it for some of my takeaway comments.



View The Bike-sharing World Map in a larger map

As you can see if you look closely, the U.S. has a lot of bike-sharing programs… planned or under construction. Not so many in place today. But hey, who’s counting (other than Russell Meddin and Paul DeMaio). The most notable U.S. bike-sharing systems are probably the New York, Boston, and D.C. systems.

Europe, meanwhile, has a bazillion bike-sharing programs in place today. OK, maybe not a bazillion, but a lot. It also has a decent number of once-living-but-now-defunct programs, another sign of the more mature level of bike-sharing in Europe.

And then there’s China and Japan, which also have a large number of programs, as well as several planned. I’ll also note that China has at least one or two ginormous programs. For example, the Hangzhou, China bike sharing system (last I heard) has 50,000 bikes at 2,050 stations. It is used for approximately 240,000 trips a day. By 2020, the system is supposed to include 175,000 bikes! Here’s a video on the Hangzhou system from Streetfilms:

Of course, there are a few other bike-sharing programs in other locations, but those three regions certainly lead the show — not very surprising, given the high(ish) level of investment needed to get these programs going, as well as the fact that they are particularly well suited for high-density cities. (Note: lest you get confused, there are no programs, no planned or under construction programs, and no defunct programs in the Southern Ocean — that’s just the legend.)

I’m happy to say that I use the Wrocław, Poland bike-sharing program regularly (well, not in winter — the bikes are removed in winter). I’ve seen Barcelona’s bicing program — very nice one. And I’ve seen a few other, smaller ones. Have you seen or used any?