Daily Tomorrow-An Eco-blog about green living, health and the environment

Tuesday Travels: San Francisco thinks big on bikes

by Ali on October 9th, 2007

The first time I visited San Francisco I was shocked, at the traffic. I had this romantic idea of everyone riding around on Trolleys so walking around amid bumper to bumper commuters was a bit of a eye-opener. I am psyched to see that San Fran is getting on the bike-share program.

The San Francisco Chronicle reported last week that the city is close to implementing a bike-sharing program, taking a lead from European cities like Copenhagen, Helsinki and Paris (which has one of the biggest bike-sharing programs to date).

From S.F. moving to catch up with European bike-sharing programs:

San Francisco is one push of the pedal closer to offering residents and visitors a bike-sharing program in an effort to ease traffic congestion and to promote health through exercise…San Francisco residents want City Hall to make good on the official goal of reducing auto congestion and air pollution, and that biking is a good way to help do that. And the easier the city makes it for people to use a two-wheeler, the more likely they will.

The bike-sharing program in Paris has had extraordinary success in part to the bikes being readily available and cost-effective - a weekly pass is under $7 and an annual pass is about $41, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.

How the San Francisco bike-sharing program comes together will be revealed soon with officials meeting this month. The SFC also noted that other U.S. cities like Washington, D.C., Portland, Chicago and New York might follow the west coast lead. Oh sunny, green California again! I love it. I’ll have to get back to San Fran when the bikes are in motion.

More mobile news:

• Bike Sharing to Save Cities at Inhabitat
• And don’t forget Transportation Tuesday at Inhabitat!

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POSTED IN: CO2 emissions, Tuesday Travels