#bikeshare — Public Fediverse posts
Live and recent posts from across the Fediverse tagged #bikeshare, aggregated by home.social.
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Giving the new LimeBike the downtown Seattle extreme hills test.Lime has launched 500 new “LimeBikes” in Seattle, a new model with smaller wheels and a lower center of gravity compared to the company’s existing “Gen 4 E-Bike,” resulting in a bike that looks a lot like the company’s sit-down scooter they call the LimeGlider.
The new LimeBike, with a name harkening back to the company’s pre-scooter days, should be more stable when carrying weight in the basket. The bike hopefully will also be less likely to fall over and block sidewalks due to its lower center of mass. Like the Gen 4 E-bike, the LimeBike motor will activate via pedal-assist and throttle, whichever the user chooses. The form factor may also draw wider appeal since it may be less intimidating to some users than a bike with full-size wheels. The LimeGliders have seen lots of use since they launched, for example, and may be attracting users over the Gen 4 E-Bikes that look more like traditional bikes. The Glider has been able to bridge the gap between a bike and a stand-up scooter, and it will be very interesting to see if the new LimeBike can appeal to scooter users in a way the existing bikes do not.
UPDATE 5/11: I finally tracked one down, and oh boy it is very good (no, this post is NOT sponsored). My biggest fear was that it would be a scooter with worthless pedals attached so that it would count as a bicycle like the Veo “bikes” from a few years ago, and I am very happy to report that this is not at all the case. The new LimeBike is the best bike share bike I’ve ever tried, and it’s not even close. I took it on the same extreme test loop I have taken nearly every other micromobility device: Up Spring Street from 2nd to 4th Avenues downtown for a worst case climbing test, then down Madison from 4th to 2nd for a worst case braking test. If a bike can handle this loop, then it can handle anything. Not only did the new LimeBike perform flawlessly, I was able to pedal up these ridiculously steep hills at 12 mph without significant effort. It also easily passed the hardest test of all: Getting started on a steep uphill (many devices have failed this one). Perhaps due to the smaller wheels the bike seemed to have a lot more torque than any other micromobility device I’ve ever tried, which helps with climbing and getting started from a stop. The bike’s pedal assist feels more responsive and natural than the Gen 4 E-Bike it is replacing, so I didn’t feel compelled to even touch the throttle. But beyond power, it was just so comfortable.
— Advertisement —The new seat post adjustment latch seems unnecessarily large at first glance, but it’s so intuitive and easy to use to get the saddle at the right height. For a bike where you’ll probably want to adjust this every time you ride, this design is brilliant (assuming it holds up well with time and wear). The lower stepover height makes the thing even more approachable. The lower cargo area is also great, though it is not a cycletruck-style design as I had initially thought it was. I thought the basket was attached to the frame, but it does move with the fork when turning. However, it didn’t feel like the handlebars wanted to flop to the side when there was stuff in it. Thanks to the pedals, the LimeBike is much more zippy than its similar-looking cousin, the LimeGlider sit-down scooter, and on flat ground I was comfortably able to pedal beyond 15 mph, the point that the electric motor stops providing assistance. The bike felt good to ride even without the motor whirring, which is not something I can say about any other shared e-bike I’ve tried. Honestly, I think if they sold this thing in stores people would buy it. You could happily and comfortably ride it for hours around town (buy a LimePass minute bundle or subscribe to LimePrime rather than paying by the minute if you’re going to do this). I had high hopes for this design, and it blew my expectations away.
They are a bit difficult to track down. As of now, only 500 of Lime’s 4,000 bikes in Seattle will be the new model. In the Lime app, the LimeBike does have a slightly different icon from the Gen 4 E-Bike and the Glider if you are determined to track one down yourself (if you’re doing so today, downtown might be your best bet as I saw several down there this morning).
Back to the original story:
— Advertisement —At least on paper, the LimeBike addresses my biggest issues with the LimeGlider. Perhaps because I am so used to biking, I do not like the lack of an adjustable-height seat on the Glider and the fact that it feels kind of awkward to stand while riding it. It feel much more comfortable and in-control when I am seated higher, though this is likely a matter of personal preference. The Glider can also struggle a bit going up the steepest hills. The new LimeBike has pedals, so you should be able to help it up hills, and it has an adjustable-height seat. I have not yet had a chance to test ride the new LimeBike, but I will attempt to hunt one down and will update when I do.
As someone who rides bikes every day, I really like the Gen 4 E-Bike. The company is only replacing 500 of their 4,000 Seattle e-bikes with the new model at this time, so the company will keep the Gen 4 bikes in operation for a while longer. However, the new bike fits better into their operations, so if it is a success they will likely phase out the old bikes eventually. The Gen 4 bike was based heavily on the JUMP bike design that the company inherited when it acquired its competitor in the early days of the pandemic in 2020. It’s a solid tank of a bike with good brakes and zippy acceleration. But ridership is consistently higher on the scooters than the bikes, so I am open to the idea that what I am personally seeking is not in step with the average person.
The bike industry seems to be leaning toward bikes with 20-inch wheels, which have a lot of practical advantages over larger wheel sizes even if they take bumps a tiny bit harder. They can more easily fit shorter riders, for example. It is also easier to mount cargo to the frame rather than the fork. It is also easier to get high torque/low gearing, a high-demand bike spec in hilly Seattle. Our family cargo bike is a Tern GSD, which has two 20-inch wheels and is fantastic at hauling anything and anyone I put on it. This isn’t to say 20-inch wheels are always better, but mini velos are having a moment. Rodriguez makes a pretty cool one here in Seattle called the Pony Keg. They also have one called the 6-Pack covered in couplings so it can fit inside a 20″ x 20″ suitcase. (No, they do not sponsor me, I just think these are really cool).
Lime’s Seattle ridership continues to climb to levels few would have predicted even five years ago. Their bikes and scooters carried 57,000 people on the day of the Seahawks parade in February, which is on par with the number of cars that drive across the Aurora Bridge. Data that Lime reports to SDOT shows that the company carried 943,200 trips in April, a 43% increase over April 2025, which itself was a 115% increase over April 2024. To date (through May 7), Seattle is at 3,218,800 trips in 2026, and Bike Month just began. The summer months are when Lime ridership usually balloons. These are astounding numbers, showing that Lime is a serious part of our city’s year-round transportation system now.
With competitor Bird no longer operating in Seattle as of this month, Lime seems to have officially won Seattle’s 9-year shared micromobility cage match. It may be time to revisit our city’s relationship with Lime since our existing permit system is written to encourage competition, yet it’s not clear who else is in a position to compete with Lime at this time. It is a great thing for micromobility that Lime seems to have figured out how to make this work, but it’s also not usually good for users when one company has a monopoly. Seattle may want to figure out how it can ensure Lime’s success also benefits Seattle residents into the future.
The Lime Glider seems to have not cannibalized ridership from the standing scooters or bikes. Instead, it just added more trips on top, helping to explain Lime’s surging trip counts. Chart from SDOT’s Shared Micromobility Data Dashboard.Image from Lime.#SEAbikes #Seattle
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My city’s subway has done impressively well at recovering from its pandemic-induced collapse in ridership, but the transportation system that has rebounded better yet around Washington relies on only two wheels per vehicle.
And despite not having an everyday office to commute to and from, I’ve been along for much of this ride at Capital Bikeshare. Our bike-sharing service continues to serve as a convenient and cheaper alternative to Metro for trips into the District and between events in D.C., and a few other changes have further elevated CaBi’s role in my transportation toolkit.
One looked like a downgrade when it was announced in 2021 with inadequate advance notice: The increase in the annual membership fee from $85 to $95 also extended the length of a free ride for members on a regular bike from 30 minutes to 45 minutes. That means I can get from my house to Capitol Hill and points slightly beyond in a single ride without having to worry about having to stop midway to dock one bike and take out another.
Another arrived with less discussion than CaBi’s introduction of new, extra-cost e-bikes: updated “classic” bikes, distinguishable by a longer cargo shelf in front of the handlebars and a red fairing covering the top of the back wheel, that feature a continuously variable transmission instead of the three gears of the older bikes. Those newer rides are easier to take on moderately hillier routes, which means much of D.C. and its neighbors.
A third has come from local governments: The District and Arlington have done impressive work in adding bike lanes that aren’t just painted white lines but cycle tracks split from car traffic by concrete dividers.
Then I bought a bike helmet that I can easily grab for most trips: a Closca folding model, which I picked up on sale at $60 on Amazon after reading the Bicycle Helmet Safety Institute’s approving assessment of it among other foldable helmets. This neatly solved two problems I’d had with using the helmet I’ve long worn for recreational rides on weekends: It’s not gross from caked-on sweat, and because its concentric rings snap folded in a second or two, I can tuck it into my regular laptop bag even with my laptop already there.
Millions of other Washington-area cyclists seem to agree with my assessment of CaBi. Its public stats show that the service–operated by Motivate, a company the ride-hailing firm Lyft bought in 2018–has grown from 337,704 trips in May of 2019 to 515,394 in May of 2024. That remains far below Metro’s daily ridership even as dented by continued remote work, yet it’s still good enough to vault our bikeshare system past Chicago’s to become the second most-used bikeshare network in the U.S.
Finally, almost 23 years after my overdue introduction to CaBi, I’ve taken the bait of its Bike Angels rewards program, which offers kickbacks to cyclists who take bikes out of stations nearing capacity or park bikes at those nearing emptiness. This neatly slots into the intersection between my fondness for gamification schemes and my readiness to overthink any commercial transaction, and so far it’s only required me to alter my bikeshare routine in three ways to cash in. First I check the CaBi app for stations offering an extra incentive for dropoffs or pickups, then I alter my own course accordingly as long as it’s not more than two or three blocks out of the way, and finally I redouble those efforts when the app says I can earn double or triple points.
And once you convert those points in the app for e-bike credit–the sliding redemption scale encourages holding off, because 80 points for $10 beats 10 points for $1–you can burn those rewards on speedier e-bike rides that in turn generate outsized rewards when a Bike Angels bonus activates. For a more detailed look into how these incentives can twist a cyclist’s behavior, see Chris Person’s strategy guide to the equivalent system at New York’s considerably more expensive Citi Bike.
I’m not going to say that all of this amounts to one giant leap towards the Copenhagenification of D.C. But all of these small steps combined have made this place a better place for getting around without so many cars.
6/15/2024: I rewrote the last paragraph after a better conclusion popped into my head not long after I woke up Saturday and added a little more explanation of Bike Angels.
https://robpegoraro.com/2024/06/14/bikeshare-keeps-rolling-along/
#BikeAngels #bikeCommuting #bikeshare #biking #CaBi #CapitalBikeshare #CloscaHelmet #CloscaHelmetLoop #cycling #foldingBikeHelmet #gamification #Lyft #micromobility #Motivate