Denver, Colorado, September 12, 2013.
Representatives from 29 cities convened in Denver, CO this week to discuss the future of bike sharing in the United States. NACTO co-hosted the roundtable with the not-for-profit Denver Bike Sharing, which launched the second bike share system in the United States, Denver B-Cycle, in 2010. This roundtable came at the conclusion of a summer that has witnessed widespread excitement and positive media attention on bike share systems launching around the nation. New York’s CitiBike, Chicago’s Divvy, Columbus’ CoGo BikeShare, and San Francisco’s Bay Area Bike Share have all launched within the past three months and will be joined by systems in Seattle, Phoenix, Indianapolis, and many other major American cities in late 2013 and 2014.
Attendees discussed both the opportunities and unique challenges of implementing bike share systems, comparing experiences across cities. The dialogue allowed bike share practitioners to learn from each other’s mistakes and successes, and built a network for future peer-to-peer conversations. The meeting was exclusive to bike share system owners, creating an environment free of conflicts of interest with potential bidders.
“The meeting was an unprecedented gathering of practitioners in this burgeoning market,” said Janette Sadik-Khan, New York City Transportation Commissioner and NACTO President. “Bike share is transforming the way people move through cities, and it’s important to cultivate this growing public transit mode.”
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About NACTO
NACTO is an association of 16 major US cities formed to exchange transportation ideas, insights and practices and cooperatively approach national transportation issues. Members include Atlanta, Baltimore, Boston, Chicago, Detroit, Houston, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, New York, Philadelphia, Phoenix, Portland, San Diego, San Francisco, Seattle and Washington, DC. Affiliate members of NACTO include Arlington (VA), Austin, Burlington (VT), Cambridge, Hoboken, Indianapolis, Louisville, Memphis, Oakland, Salt Lake City, and Ventura (CA).
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