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Boris warns of teething problems as Barclays Cycle Hire Scheme goes live

It's "more of a gradual launch than a big bang," says London's Mayor...

Yesterday evening, Central London was awash with trailers carrying dozens of bikes at a time as the city’s new hire bikes – which we reviewed here yesterday on road.cc – were ferried to their docking stations ahead of the Barclays Cycle Hire Scheme going live at 6am this morning. However, Mayor of London Boris Johnson has warned that there are likely to be some teething problems.

In an interview with the radio station LBC, Mr Johnson said: “I have no doubt lots of things will go wrong.” While he added that the project, modelled closely on the Bixi scheme in Montreal, would be a “great success” in the long term, he explained: “The reality is that the software issues and technical issues of getting the whole thing up and running for tomorrow has been extremely difficult.”

Mr Johnson insisted that he expected that today’s launch “is going to be fine. It will be more of a gradual launch than a big bang,” but continued: “I have so many concerns it's hard to pick one out.”

He added that concerns raised by the public about the bikes included whether they would float should they end up in the Thames, and what might happen in the event bikes were stolen or vandalized or “if they end up at the Taj Mahal”. We’re guessing he didn’t mean the Indian restaurant in Richmond.

Mr Johnson also said that net of tax, each bike cost “£800 or £900,” admitting that “It's a lot of dosh for a bike, no question about it, but it will come down as the scheme expands.”

Meanwhile, Transport for London told the Evening Standard that 1,300 of the 6,000 bikes – nearly a quarter of the total – would not be in place for this morning’s launch.
The newspaper also claims that 3,000 of the 10,200 docking points – nearly one in three – are not yet ready. The newspaper made its calculation after going to 374 sites that appear on TfL’s cycle hire map and found that 284 were complete, 34 were still being constructed and work was yet to start at 56 locations.

According to TfL, around 8,000 docking points at 330 docking stations were due to be operational this morning. Until the end of August, the scheme will only be available to registered users, who can sign up on the TfL website and buy an electronic key for £3, which will have to be activated before it can be used.
 

Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.

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Bev | 13 years ago
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was in London today - bikes seem good - saw loads out and about but have to say that even with 3 gears they look very heavy and did see some people struggling up the hills! (not real hills mind - more upward slanting roads!)

Biggest problem I encountered was some d*ckheads riding on the pavement - all those people that are blocking your progress are supposed to be here and you are supposed to be where the cars are! (A few friendly people outside one of the local hostelries advised them that they were in the wrong place and that they should go back to where they belonged (I assume he meant the road!) Oh! and that the cyclist mother wasn't married to the cyclist's father although I fail to see what bearing that had on the cyclists ability to discern pavement from road!!!)

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solentine | 13 years ago
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Great, found a bike, used a bike, parked a bike. Boris you're a fool, but the bike hire experience was great.

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TiNuts | 13 years ago
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Did anyone clock the idiot black-cab-driver on Channel 4 news just now? When asked about the scheme he just shook his head in disbelief and said "There'll be a load of em getting killed next". Hmm, no surprises there, then.

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Fringe replied to TiNuts | 13 years ago
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TiNuts wrote:

Did anyone clock the idiot black-cab-driver on Channel 4 news just now? When asked about the scheme he just shook his head in disbelief and said "There'll be a load of em getting killed next". Hmm, no surprises there, then.

reminds me of what one of my colleagues said after a cyclist was knocked over at a crossing near our office "it wer won of your lot".

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TRs Blurb n Blog | 13 years ago
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First problem:

This web page is not available.

The web page at https://web.barclayscyclehire.tfl.gov.uk/member might be temporarily down or it may have moved permanently to a new web address.

Here are some suggestions:
Reload this web page later.
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oh dear...

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