Where would you like to see a Capital Bikeshare station?

[Tim Kelley]

Capital Bikeshare is set to launch on the morning of September 20 in DC! With the launch mere days away, we’re already working on expansion plans for the service to introduce it to more areas of the County. Help us do this! Send your suggestions for intersections or destinations in the County where you’d like to see a Capital Bikeshare station.

Topic

[xiann]

@aglenn 3185 wrote:

The Columbia Pike corridor desperately needs Bike Share Stations!! Let’s start with Columbia Pike at Walter Reed and S. Glebe Roads!

Agreed. Also, Columbia Pike & South Courthouse Rd would be a great spot for bikeshare.

[srm0]

@xiann 3236 wrote:

Agreed. Also, Columbia Pike & South Courthouse Rd would be a great spot for bikeshare.

I agree with aglenn and xiann, we definitely need a bikeshare station on Columbia Pike. Anywhere between S. Glebe and S. Courthouse would be great! I’d recommend Columbia Pike and S. Barton Street because it’s a central location in the Columbia Pike commercial corridor.

[brendan]

Put it near Arlington Cinema & Drafthouse for the obvious reasons plus it will make the other local businesses more accessible from CaBi stations in north arlington. Ok, really…I also want it near Papillon Cycles to send them some more business.

Brendan

[dustindanger]

All the metro stops along RB Corridor, The DHS Bus stop near Courthouse and 2nd Street South, Arlington Drafthouse area on Columbia Pike, and of course down in Shirlington!

[jrenaut]

Columbia Heights DC need more bikes. The area right around the Metro is one of the busiest spots in the system, and there are regularly no bikes at four or five of the nearby stations by 815.

[jrenaut]

How is there not a Bikeshare station on The Mall? Is this the NPS being grouchy again?

[gnarl]

Without question, the place the bikes are most needed are Columbia Pike. The Orange Line corridor has numerous options for getting around, but CoPike has only buses. People could use the bikes at PentCity Metro to reach the AF Memorial, go shopping on CoPike or dine at one of the many great restaurants. On the other hand, getting to shopping in Pent&Crystal Cities would be so much easier for CoPike residents if we had easy access to the bikes. ArlCty claims to want to build CoPike into an Urban Village, but one of the primary needs is transportation. The bikes would serve so many purposes and also not leave CoPike in the dust again!

[DaveK]

@jrenaut 3445 wrote:

How is there not a Bikeshare station on The Mall? Is this the NPS being grouchy again?

NPS has an exclusive vending contracts for their properties which will not allow CaBi stations on NPS property. They have not accepted the reasoning that it’s bicycle transit and not bike rental.

[barbnDC]

Is there any possibility to keep pushing the NPS to change its mind about allowing bike share stations near the mall? Obviously they don’t have to be in areas where it would harm aesthetics but at least a couple in a few strategic areas would make it possible for visiting friends and family to hop on a bike and get down to the Jefferson Memorial or to see the cherry blossoms at Haynes Point. Those are a little far away to walk to and as far as I know the only way you can get there is to bike, drive or have a ticket on a tourbus. Being able to hop on a bike to get down to those places would be great.

Another suggestion: could the stations have taller signs or something to make them more visible? Even when standing on the corner looking at the map saying a station should be there somewhere they’re often hard to spot because there’s no sign or anything to make them stand out.

[PotomacCyclist]

There are a couple stations less than a block from the Mall, including the station at 12th & Independence NW (Smithsonian Metro), but there’s room for more.

I agree that a station near 15th St & Maine Ave SW at the Tidal Basin would be a good spot. It’s close to the Washington Monument, the Jefferson Memorial and East Potomac Park (Hains Point). There are also museums and gov’t office buildings nearby, so there should be steady demand for bikes/docks over there. The station could be installed on the east side of 15th St, so that it wouldn’t be placed on NPS areas.

[Greenbelt]

How bad is the problem of undocked or unattended CaBi bikes being stolen or vandalized? Wouldn’t it be nice to have a bike station at every Metrorail station, so people could get off the train, use a bike for local errands, and get back on the train?

[barbnDC]

I participated in a survey after Smartbike ended and before CaBi started and I put that down as something that would be desirable in a bikesharing program, the ability to borrow a bike to run errands where there weren’t stations, lock it up and then return it to a station. You wouldn’t want to have to ask people to remember to bring their own bike lock but the bikes could come with built-in locks for this purpose. I said the problem with the old Smartbike system was that I often didn’t want to go from station to station. I think that would open up a whole new level of bikesharing and would possibly be too much of a demand on the current system.

BTW I do have to say that I own 3 bikes and I’ve had a bikeshare membership for a month and so far I have found it very useful and convenient. The new system is miles ahead of the old Smartbikes.

[acc]

Ran into one of my friends who lives in NW DC and uses Capital Bikeshare. His points were:

1. The yearly fee of $75 is great.
2. He has saved at least twice as much by not taking cabs.
3. At night it is hard to find a space to return the bike in NW.
4. He asks for more stations in NW.

Hope this is helpful feedback,

ann

[Author]

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