Friday, February 11, 2011

Reality Proves a Setback for Parisian Bike Rentals

 
In my recent Q&A with Ryan Chin, of MIT’s Smart Cities research group, we talked about the similarities between his team’s proposed Mobility on Demand systems and the Vélib’ bike-share program in Paris. Basically, Mobility on Demand will be a souped-up version of Vélib’—using electric vehicles instead of bicycles and a sophisticated fleet-management system that incorporates GPS tracking. But developing the vehicles and pioneering the software is only part of MIT’s challenge, as an article in last Saturday’s New York Times made abundantly clear. 
 

A parisian bike rental, by Bob_S ♪♪  
A parisian bicycle rental, photo by Danny McL
more about bikes in Europe:

2 comments:

  1. electric bikes make no sense. Too expensive. The cost doesn't make sense to use electric bikes for short trips. They make sense for longer trips or trips in places with difficult topography.

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  2. You're right Richard. But it's good investment for the future sustainable transport modes like electric car.

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