A bike hire scheme for Brighton and Hove is now set to go following full funding approval from the Coast to Capital (C2C) Local Transport Body yesterday (Thursday, 26 November).
The news comes two days after the council’s Environment, Transport and Sustainability Committee voted to support the scheme on Tuesday.
C2C funding is for £1.16 million from the Local Growth Fund. The council’s Local Transport Plan and other funding streams, such as developer contributions, will fund the remaining £290,000 for the total £1.45 million infrastructure and start-up costs.
Councillor Gill Mitchell, lead member for environment and transport, said: “This is the final piece of the jigsaw and we can now move ahead with finding an operator for the scheme. It will give more choice to those who live, work or visit the city – providing the opportunity to get around by bike, even if you don’t own or can’t bring one with you.”
The aim is to establish a bike sharing service, similar to the so called “Boris bikes” in London, with 430 bikes available from a minimum of 50 hubs or docking points in the city.
The vision is for bike sharing hubs to be installed along the seafront and near major city destinations and attractions. The scheme would also operate along the A27 corridor, heading out to the university campus sites at Falmer.
Research by the council’s Transport Planning team has revealed demand for bike hire in the initial scheme area. Many homes in the densely populated seafront areas do not have space to store bicycles securely. If the scheme is a success, more hubs could be established, for instance at Preston Park and Portslade stations.
Consultation on locations of the hubs will be carried out with residents, businesses, councillors and other partners in the proposed scheme area.
Brighton & Hove’s bikeshare scheme is due to start in May 2017. The next stage will be to tender for a suitable operator of the service. The chosen supplier would commit to an initial three year contract and be required to supply the bikes plus associated equipment as well as management and maintenance of the service.
I am just truly amazed that £1.45m of public money is being squandered on a scheme that was originally rejected as not being cost effective on the city due to the hilly landscape by the previous leader of the transport group.
I would just love to see the cost justification for this that showed the success criteria and savings likely to come to the city as a result and the names of those who will resign if they are not achieved.
I would really like to see how many people are expected to use the 450 bikes instead of walking or using buses, the charges that people will have to pay, and the expected ongoing costs to the city for running the scheme.
It seems that any amount of money is thrown away on projects supporting cycling with no attempt to determine whether they are optimal of offer any real benefits.
Cases in point include the grossly over-engineered Old Shoreham Road cycle lanes; the grandiose Edward Street, Brighton Station and Lewes Road schemes that have resulted in minimal increases in cycling; together with such vanity excesses form the previous council such as the London Road station Cycle Ramps, the Brighton Station Cycle Hub including café and yoga facilities, and the 5 bike stands in Havelock Road that seem to have been a thank you gift to the head of Bricycles.