The fact that more than $1 million in federal funding has been allocated for ValleyBike Share doesn’t persuade us this program can get off the ground.
Yes, having an initial fleet of 234 bicycles available for short trips between local destinations could take cars off the road and improve people’s health – two solid reasons why public dollars can be put to good use in programs like this.
But they don’t work everywhere (especially in harsh climates) and wanting them in principle doesn’t make them succeed in practice. We’re pulling for BikeShare’s intrepid Valley backers to make this viable, but the odds are long.
Earlier this month, the Metropolitan Planning Organization greenlighted using $1.17 million in federal transportation money to buy bikes, a key first step in lining up operational funding. The news this month included possible locations for bike-sharing kiosks, one of which is the area in front of John M. Greene Hall at Smith College. It’s possible that Smith students will opt in to ValleyBike Share by signing up for memberships that allow them to rent bikes to ride downtown and back or around the city and Valley. We’re not so convinced this will reduce car trips, but it will probably be good for student health.
In most metropolitan bike-share programs, the purpose for users is to get from point A to point B. Because they need to be sturdy and hold up to rough use, these bikes tend not to be lightweight models that modern cyclists would take for long rides –and of course, devoted cyclists have invested in their own gear. Would the purpose of the Smith kiosk be to get students from point A to point A? And if so, what, exactly, is the point?
As they seek corporate funding, champions of ValleyBike Share will have to answer questions like that. The consultant handling this for the Pioneer Valley Planning Commission is Alta Planning + Design of Cambridge. That group estimates it will cost nearly $430,000 a year to run ValleyBike Share. The PVPC is coordinating the effort.
To be sure, we’re talking about a lot more than bikes rolling in and out of Smith College. Partners in this venture would include Amherst as well as Northampton, the University of Massachusetts and the cities of Holyoke and Springfield. But Northampton is the lead community, so it has to work for Northampton too.
Before a planned summer 2017 debut, the project needs to secure a contract with the state Department of Transportation and line up backing from private companies. While there may be a sugar daddy in the wings, we’re not sure who that would be. Annual operating costs come to nearly half of what the United Way of Hampshire County fights to raise each year. Local companies able to provide philanthropic support are hit up hard and often for money. Some might like the visibility of ValleyBike, but it may be a struggle to land a big backer. As we noted two years ago, bike-sharing programs have faced delays due to difficulties signing up sponsors.
The high yearly operating costs aren’t surprising, given that this fleet will need not only maintenance but rebalancing. Someone has to be sure bikes aren’t stacking up at an overloaded check-in kiosk and unavailable at another. Then there is the problem of geography. While this is to be called ValleyBike Share, the participating communities are – let’s face it – located too far from one another to be part of a single network. It is simply ludicrous to think that a bike taken out of the kiosk at Smith would be dropped off in Springfield, or vice versa. Even locally, longer trips on bikes that may or may not comfortably fit the rider could be a hard sell. In a Gazette story this month, the campus sustainability manager at the University of Massachusetts said this: “ValleyBike will allow students and employees the opportunity to easily connect with the rest of the Pioneer Valley.”
Reality check: There is nothing that easy about riding from Amherst to Northampton. The newly rehabbed rail trail helps, but this option will struggle to register as a real alternative, for students, to hopping aboard a PVTA bus, for which they already receive a subsidy.
We too think it would be great if the Valley was the sort of place that could sustain a bike-sharing network. We’re afraid it just isn’t.