Follow-on to where did the bikes go?.
SACOG staff provided this information:
About a month ago, Lime pulled their e-bikes from the cities of Sacramento and West Sacramento. They are renewing their permits in both cities with the intent of only continuing to provide e-scooters. Bird has about 30 e-bikes available to rent in the City of Sacramento.
Since the launch of bike share in the SACOG region, Sacramento and West Sacramento have had open market permitting for shared micromobility, which allows any private operator to apply for a permit. If the operator meets all local requirements, they are then able to deploy shared bikes and scooters. For more information on these cities’ permitting processes, please see the links below:
- City of Sacramento – https://www.cityofsacramento.org/Public-Works/Transportation/Planning-Projects/Shared-Rideables
- City of West Sacramento – https://www.cityofwestsacramento.org/government/departments/capital-projects-and-transportation/shared-e-bikes-e-scooters-jump
The City of Davis and UC Davis recently launched a shared micromobility system with Spin. More information on this program and their plans is available here: https://taps.ucdavis.edu/spin.
Though not obvious from this response, I have been told by several sources that SACOG is no longer involved in bike share in any way. They have washed their hands of the program that they originated. The last time bike share was on the agenda for SACOG board or committees was May 2023. Since then, nothing. No discussion, no announcements, no communication with the public.
City of Sacramento staff said that the permit that Lime has with the city specifies a number of ‘devices’ but does not require that any of them be bikes.
This loss of a transportation service again points out that bike share systems must be at least publicly owned, though they might be operated by a private company with expertise. This is the second time that a private bike share has pulled out of the city, and region, without any notice to customers or the agencies. This is unacceptable.
For my earlier take on bike share ownership and operation: public or private bike share?. Additional posts under category bike-share.
Getting Around Sacramento 
Thanks, Dan, for confirming SACOG’s squirreliness and dissembling. Avoidance of being in the sh$%storm pathway is truly one of their longterm strengths. Have you any thoughts re the “Superpedestrian” e-scooters brand that arrived recently w zero City announcement?
I’ve been curious re their “unusual” time metering charges decisions, among others…
🤔🕵😒
LikeLike
Superpedestrian, which recently started offering scooters and some sit scooters (but no bikes) in Sacramento, is apparently going to cease all North American operations by the end of the year.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Indeed… while the City’s “Active Transportation” staff remain decidedly incommunicado re micro-mobility program oversight or plans or transparency or statistics or … 🍿🕵🙄😒
LikeLike
As of 2023-12-20, there are no bike-share bikes shown in the Bird app. It appears that Bird has removed all bikes from service. It was announced that Bird in the US has filed for bankruptcy, though it is unknown how this may affect availability of Bird devices.
LikeLike