Sunday, June 2, 2013

BikeShare starts out with a thump

From the NY Post:

A woman on a Citi Bike was hit by a livery cab when she ran a red light in Greenwich Village, cops said.

The rider, 25, was hospitalized with non-life-threatening injuries after the 12:45 accident at Houston and MacDougal streets.

The damaged 45-pound bike was spotted in the back of a police cruiser (above) yesterday afternoon on Greenwich Avenue shortly before 2:30 p.m.

The bike’s front wheel appeared to be bent.

19 comments:

Anonymous said...

This is just the beginning. I hate to see anyone hurt but it will probably be pretty entertaining and show just what kind of assholes both bike riders and auto drivers are in NYC.

We MUST have the worst drivers in the country - and I don't care what they say about Boston.

Anonymous said...

Soon after Bloomberg leaves office,
NYC will pull this program and rip up all those idiotic bike lanes.

I give it about 2 years at the most.

Uh...anyone notice the "Citi" bike logo?
It's the same as Citi Corp. Bank.

Are they partially funding it?

Jerry Rotondi said...

This is just another item on the list of Bloomberg blunders that's eating away at our tax money.

I'll be glad to see the runt gone, come November.

Anonymous said...

Now what did that one incident cost the taxpayers...
one wrecked bike and one patrol car dispatched to pick it up?

Those cops could have been doing their real jobs somewhere else where they were really needed!

Anonymous said...

It gets better. The program is not sustainable and will lose money.

georgetheatheist said...

It doesn't have to make money. Recycling garbage is a financial failure and we still keep it.

It makes the green plebes "feel" good.

Anonymous said...


"The program is not sustainable and will lose money."

That's an unsupported statement, as the article cited gives no indication as to the estimated annual operating costs.

And considering the system had been in operation for only 5 days when this article was written, it's pretty ridiculous to base any projections on the current membership number.

Anonymous said...

Those cops could have been doing their real jobs somewhere else where they were really needed!

Yes, like responding to one of the probably thousands of fender bender accidents that occur each day. But somehow this one incident is the waste of police resources.

Anonymous said...

As of 5 p.m. Friday, the company reported signing up 25,276 members at $95 a pop.

Considering that the system is not yet available for daily or weekly users, this number reflects the amount of people who were willing to sign up for an annual membership WITHOUT EVEN TRYING IT. I would imagine a significant percentage of people who are somewhat interested in this program would want to try it for a day or week before signing up for an annual membership. Expect the annual numbers to increase significantly once the system is open to daily users.

Anonymous said...

Great. Even more people who don't know how to ride bikes in city traffic getting into accidents.

Peter said...

There is no city funding for bike-share. Zero.

As of last night, there were 26,000 annual members signed up for annual membership. I expect we'll be at 30,000 by end of this month.

As for the bike lanes..please contact me at the website below if you'd like to privately wager if they are removed.

Anonymous said...

I live in the village and I could count the close calls not to mention most of the riders on 6th and 7th Avenues that I observed did not use the bike lanes. Several of the bikers seemed unsure of themselves as I would be on a bike today. I can't wait for the week day traffic the law suits should come out of the pockets of Bloomberg and Citicorp and not the taxpayer.

Anonymous said...

Hey Anon 9, do you know what the editors of the New York Daily News don't know? What is the capital cost and the operating cost of "CitiBike"?

Here's how it works - if the promoters of "CitiBike" were certain it would be profitable, they would publicize their costs as well as their revenues. As a private operation, we only get to see the numbers what they want us to see.

Since they don't, the Daily News and the rest us are skeptical that this can cover its costs.

Anonymous said...

WTF is it with these bikers?
Is there a powerful bike lobby around that pols have to kiss their asses to get votes?

Most urban bikers are sloppy numbskulls.
They don't follow traffic rules.

In Europe bikers are licensed and are required to carry insurance.

Plates on their bikes are mandatory.

Tassilo von Parseval said...

In Europe bikers are licensed and are required to carry insurance.

Plates on their bikes are mandatory


You just pulled that out of your ass, didn't you?

It's gibberish. I don't know of a single country in Europe where bike riders either need to be licensed or insured. There are no plates on bikes either. I've lived the first 27 years of my life in Germany before moving to NYC in 2006 so I certainly do know what I am talking about in this particular instance.

Queens Crapper said...

here we go:

Citi Bike sharing hits a bump in big rollout

Anonymous said...

Wait until the lawsuits start....

Ms. Tsouris said...

I have a cousin I love who is a lobbyist for a national bike organization. However, the people she's lobbying for have a lot of assholes amongst them. They are arrogant and have been empowered to not follow the rules of the road or common courtesy. I was cursed out by a bicyclist at a red light at 23rd and 6th the other night because I, along with 2 others, had the audacity to get into a cab near that corner during a red light. This asshole needed to get right to the corner and how dare we block his way by hailing and then getting into the cab. In his world, we should have been walking, I suppose. This woman obviously didn't feel the need to stop at a red light like the other vehicles.

Anonymous said...

I love the bike lanes! So does my Harley!!