Here in Washington, D.C. we recently celebrated the first anniversary of the wildly popular Capital Bikeshare bike sharing system. It is a point of pride in the nation's capital that the largest bike sharing system in North America has become such a success. With demand so high, CaBi is adding new stations in The District and Arlington County, Virginia and expanding to Alexandria, Virginia and Montgomery County, Maryland. The apple red bicycles are a hit with locals and tourists alike and are a potent reminder to politicians on Capitol Hill that voters ride bikes and expect our national and regional leaders to increase funding for bicycle infrastructure, education and safety across America.
The aim is build up bike sharing in D.C. and other U.S. cities that rival those in Europe. A trip to Europe this past summer reveals that, at least in Washington, D.C., we have come a long way to achieving that goal. Here are photos of bike sharing systems from my recent trip to Europe and Israel.
July 22-23, 2011 -- Paris is one of the most bike-friendly cities in the world. The City of Light is home to the largest bike sharing system on the planet - Velib, which boasts over 20,000 bicycles and 1,202 bicycle sharing stations. There were Velib stations and people riding Velib bikes everywhere I looked.
And Paris makes it easy for bikers with great bike infrastructure, including lots of dedicated bike lanes, shared lane marking and bicycle traffic signals.
Like Brussels, Paris' bike sharing system only accepts European Smart Cards with embedded microprocessor chips so I was out of luck with my old-style American credit card. Thankfully, there was a bike shop a few blocks down from my hostel along Canal Saint-Martin. For ten euros I rented a beat-up old mountain bike which did the job.
Another great way to get around Paris is by riding the underground subway system, called the Paris Métro or Métropolitain (French: Métro de Paris). The Art Nouveau architecture is impressive, the stations are fairly clean and the trains are fast and efficient.
There were a couple of modern additions to the Metro, which first opened to the public in 1900. At the recently renovated Franklin D. Roosevelt Station I noticed there are platform edge doors, which are barriers that help prevent accidents such as falling on the tracks. There is also an interactive touch-screen system map which can prove really helpful if you get lost.
I didn't snap a photo so this example of platform edge doors in the Paris Metro system is taken from the Internet.
Click here for more observations of Paris on Josh's Travel Blog.
Here are more photos from Paris. Click here to see the photo set on Flickr.
Here is video of me biking along the Bassin de l'Arsenal.
And here is video of a Paris Metro subway train arriving at the station.
