Increase in Lime Bikes on LL

[AylwardS]

 

This weekend is the end of the week for Living Streets #cuttheclutter

 

https://www.livingstreets.org.uk/get-involved/campaign-with-us/cut-the-clutter

 

Report through here maybe reports in numbers will raise the importance. 

 

Don’t know about others but I’m struggling to recall walking anywhere in London where the pavement was clear all the way. 

[first mate]

Fair point but the fact that the additional clutter is being made by hire bikes that are meant to augment and promote 'active travel' does put a different gloss on the problem. Councils are using equality and social justice to promote these schemes so must address anything they support that simultaneously reduces equality of access and movement for vulnerable sections of society, even if they are a minority.

[Nigello]

Agreed - if part of the reasoning for the deployment of these cycles and scooters is accessibility and ease of movement then their poor parking has to be judged against these values also. 

[Lebanums]

https://www.timeout.com/london/city-life/whats-with-the-click-clacking-lime-bikes-all-over-london-right-now

This might be the reason so many of them are poorly parked. If it is so easy to tamper & use the bikes for free then they probably don't care where they leave them also. There is no penalty if they users are undetectable.

[alice]

There is something quite joyous  about that sound plus it acts as a bell might. 

[Rockets]

Duplicate post

Edited July 30, 2023 by Rockets

[Rockets]

Interesting article on the Lime bike problem here....council blames Lime bike (and other companies) Lime bike retorts (via transport consultancy research) - give us more places to park our bikes....

 

https://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/electric-bike-ebike-london-lime-rental-tfl-councils-parking-spaces-b1099280.html

 

and here is Lime's strategic motive to help offer to fund the parking bays......they want exclusivity in London.....they say...

 

It is clear that a standardised, London-wide service with more dedicated shared e-bike parking locations across the capital is now needed to help simultaneously facilitate growing popularity, maintain convenience and ensure tidy parking.

[mr.chicken]

I reckon the council could, say, ensure that no (or say 99% of)  postal address is more than 1 minute walk from a cycle parking bay, by giving over a very small fraction of street side parking to bikes rather than cars.

They only need to start with painted bays, since the self hire bikes all have stands. It would be then reasonable to demand all such bikes are left in bays.

Huge uphill struggle though because dedicating 1% of car spaces would be portrayed as a war on motorists and receive incredibly stiff opposition making it vastly more expensive for the council to implement.

The council would often use valuable pavement space rather than some of the absurdly huge amount of space dedicated to cars than whack at that particular hornets nest and get stung with high costs to repeatedly defend a decision that's both reasonable and legal.

 

On the plus side, by using a lime bike you get to kill two birds with one stone: getting to your destination and slightly hastening the demise of uber since they are running at a loss. Win win!

 

[Penguin68]

1 hour ago, mr.chicken said:

postal address is more than 1 minute walk from a cycle parking bay

You make the assumption that all, or the vast majority, of Dulwich residents would optimally choose to cycle rather than use other forms of transport.  In my experience that simply isn't so. Some clearly would, and good luck to them. Others clearly wouldn't on the grounds of age, competence, stamina, need to carry other things and/ or people, distance needed to go... well, the list is long. And, logically, if 20 households are within a minutes walk of, say a 3 bay cycle park, that's quite a lot of people who ain't getting a cycle, if everyone wanted one.

[Rockets]

Does Lime ever publish journey distances made by their riders? I seem to remember reading it was an average of about 1mile a journey - if so, is that replacing walking?

 

On the locations of rental bays, in the, clearly paid-for by Lime, Steer research into Lime they said:

 

“Lime e-bikes extend the reach of public transport – on a typical weekday morning 97% of the population within the operating zone are within two minutes walk of a bike. Around 7% of Londoners live within the same distance to tube and rail stations.”

 

And Mr Chicken, I don't think Lime want to kill off Uber as Lime was part-born from Uber when Uber sold Jump to Lime and is now owned by a VC company that Uber has a holding in! Lime is far more interested in killing off Human Forest and the other rental companies vying for the London market - in the same way Uber runs at a loss to try to kill off other cabs and take the market exclusively before hiking up prices!

[mr.chicken]

34 minutes ago, Penguin68 said:

You make the assumption that all, or the vast majority, of Dulwich residents would optimally choose to cycle rather than use other forms of transport.

And here we go!

Yep, dedicating 1 or 2% of existing completely free parking space to bikes is definitely somehow invoking the "vast majority".

4.6% of journeys in southwark are by bike, and you're objecting to dedicating maybe 1 in 100 or 1 in 50 car parking spaces to bikes.

38 minutes ago, Penguin68 said:

if 20 households are within a minutes walk of, say a 3 bay cycle park,

3 is a pretty small number. Cars take up way more space compared to bikes than you think.

39 minutes ago, Penguin68 said:

that's quite a lot of people who ain't getting a cycle, if everyone wanted one.

Well that's just hypocritical. First you complain that dedicating 1 in 50 spaces to bikes is assuming that "all, or the vast majority, of Dulwich residents would optimally choose to cycle" while simultaneously admitting 100% that it's not in fact enough for that.

You're somehow complaining that dedicating a small fraction of parking spaces to bikes is simultaneously both too much and too little at the same time.

11 minutes ago, Rockets said:

And Mr Chicken, I don't think Lime want to kill off Uber

I though uber owned Lime, meaning Lime were doing a good job of helping the cash drain. That's not actually the case despite the "uber by lime" branding, but Uber own a significant part of it and have some partnership. Lime however is not profitable (except in EBITDA which ignores the cost of all the bikes, basically),  so if they go under, it will harm Uber.

So think of it as having rides funded by a bottomless well of silicon valley cash or your little bit to help drag the never profitable uber to its  eventual demise.

I'm being a bit facetious but you get the point.

[Rockets]

It would be interesting to know how Lime (and others) are being used - I sense the majority are being used for very short journeys that are either taking modal share from walking or, in central London, public transport. Has there been any research into that?

32 minutes ago, mr.chicken said:

Lime however is not profitable (except in EBITDA which ignores the cost of all the bikes, basically),  so if they go under, it will harm Uber.

No and they won't go under because their business plan will be quite clear that they will run at a loss for a long time until they own the market exclusively and then they can gradually raise prices to become profitable (it's how they raised $1.5bn in funding before going public). I think Uber only has a minority stake anyway.

There is a lot riding on this for them so hence their request for 10,000 more bays in London and exclusivity......but you need competition to keep prices low so Sadiq won't fall for that ruse!

[Spartacus]

BBC News - Paris says au revoir to rental e-scooters
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-66682673

[Nigello]

https://limebike.typeform.com/CommunityReport#bike_plate_number=GLXQAZ
 

No need for the app and no need to fill in personal details. 

[Bic Basher]

Lime and (Human) Forest seem to be pushing riders onto their bundles which work out cheaper than PAYG.    Lime's PAYG is £1+27p per minute, while Forest is 19p per min (free for the first 10 mins) and a £1 locking fee.

 

[Rockets]

5 hours ago, Spartacus said:

BBC News - Paris says au revoir to rental e-scooters
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-66682673

Very interesting article about the politics behind the withdrawal of the service in Paris.

[first mate]

Narrowly missed by an adult male going full throttle on a lime bike on pavement on Barry Road yesterday.

Edited September 3, 2023 by first mate

[legalalien]

Looks like the plan is to extend the E-scooter trial in London - see this item in the most recent Forward Plan

https://moderngov.southwark.gov.uk/mgIssueHistoryHome.aspx?IId=50033129&PlanId=786&RPID=9252527

 

Also going to be some experimental traffic orders for parking stations for e-bikes and escooters

https://moderngov.southwark.gov.uk/mgIssueHistoryHome.aspx?IId=50033131&PlanId=786&RPID=9252532

[Rockets]

It's all about the revenue....

[heartblock]

There is a huge bike parking space just across the road to me, usually filled with.....no bikes and a few scooters on their sides. Meanwhile I have video footage of a van dropping lime bikes on the pavement all down East Dulwich Grove, including outside the newer block of flats across from the school and health centre.

So extra parking spaces will not solve the issue of bikes abandoned on pedestrian areas.

 

[Spartacus]

3 hours ago, legalalien said:

Looks like the plan is to extend the E-scooter trial in London - see this item in the most recent Forward Plan

https://moderngov.southwark.gov.uk/mgIssueHistoryHome.aspx?IId=50033129&PlanId=786&RPID=9252527

 

Also going to be some experimental traffic orders for parking stations for e-bikes and escooters

https://moderngov.southwark.gov.uk/mgIssueHistoryHome.aspx?IId=50033131&PlanId=786&RPID=9252532

I wonder if the council have asked the residents or done studies to show thete is an increased demand for eBikes or if they are just driving their own personal agenda through at the cost of their voters ? 

[Nigello]

4 hours ago, heartblock said:

There is a huge bike parking space just across the road to me, usually filled with.....no bikes and a few scooters on their sides. Meanwhile I have video footage of a van dropping lime bikes on the pavement all down East Dulwich Grove, including outside the newer block of flats across from the school and health centre.

So extra parking spaces will not solve the issue of bikes abandoned on pedestrian areas.

 

Send the video to the link I posted above and also to your councillor and MP. It’s the only way we trip-fodder can do anything constructive. 

[heartblock]

I sent to my Cllr at the time, a couple of months ago, with photos of lime bikes blocking the pavement and a complaint. They are all too busy on their careerist climbing up the greasy pole of politics to care.

[malumbu]

If you can do a better job....  it's so easy to complain, more challenging to actually work for the public whether you agree with their policies ot not.

Borderline defamation.....

[Spartacus]

15 minutes ago, malumbu said:

If you can do a better job....  it's so easy to complain, more challenging to actually work for the public whether you agree with their policies ot not.

Borderline defamation.....

The truth hurts 💔