Just a super quick post … picking this up from Gizmodo tonight:Bixi — the Montreal nonprofit company that developed the technology that powers New York City's eight-month-old CitiBike program — filed for bankruptcy protection today, after it emerged that cities including New York and Chicago were withholding payments to the company. Could the news affect CitiBike? Maybe — but not just yet.
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Ever notice how every company Bloomberg did business with either needed a government bailout or went bankrupt at the exact same time that his own wealth was increasing faster than the inflation rate of Venezuela?
ReplyDeleteThis will end in gears....
The bike-share program is too big to fail!
ReplyDeleteSeriously though, it's a growing field. They'll wither reorganize or someone will buy them up. Bike sharing isn't going away.
The gift that keeps on giving - Income from the system always goes to citibank via credit card- its just the lil' partners that suffer....BTW this company had a previous bankruptcy in the previous city they built a bike sharing program for -in canada somewhere - I think NY was locked in already when it happened in 2010 tho'
ReplyDeleteDude, CitiBANK is NOT making money of CitiBIKE. It's just an incredibly cheap, giant outdoor advertising campaign for them. There are certainly a number of Bloombergian policies that he and his buddies stood to benefit from financially (see, for example, charter schools and high-stakes testing, or his "Let's carpet Manhattan in high-rise luxury towers affordable only to oiligarchs" development policy), but this really wasn't one of them.
ReplyDeleteAs someone else said, thinking CitiBank has any connection to Citi Bike is the same as blaming CitiBank when the Mets lose at Citi Field. In both cases, the bank just paid money for the right to name it and slap their logo over everything.
ReplyDeleteMore info:
ReplyDeleteAlta is our actual operating partner and they assured via a press release that the show will go on. Bixi makes their parts, but does not run any of the US systems.
Bixi wants to sell off its division that is a supplier for US bike share systems.
It's worth noting that we're withholding payment from Bixi regarding supply issues, Chicago is too, and Alta is outright suing them for excessive delays in software services.
This would only be a calamity if it meant we could not obtain any more parts or software patches for the system. But Bixi is not liquidating at the moment, so that does not seem to be an immediate issue.
The main issue is, what's NYC DOT's contingency plan on obtaining parts/software? Or is there even one? CitiBike expansion is a serious political issue here, and it seems more than plausible to think these issues might prevent needed expansion supplies from being manufactured in a timely manner. It would not be enough to just run CitiBike as-is indefinitely, though for the sake of maintaining current service, the existing parts are nearly indestructible...
Get ride of those bike lanes next.
ReplyDeleteCitibike can PR their way by keeping publishing the mileage Citibikers have used, how many subscribers and users they have, how green this is, it's an alternative" mode of transportation, etc., but Citi, the city, and NYC Bike Share does and will not return requests for the bike share’s financial data.
ReplyDeleteCitiBike, Citibank, Citicorp, what's in name? A turd by any other name would smell as fetid.
Convictions are more dangerous foes of truth than lies.
When is the city (now that Bloomberg is out of office) going to publicize the unpleasant realities of the Citibike program? I'm close to a liaison between the city and the program and the injury/fatalities related to Citibike are eye-opening.
ReplyDeleteIn 2012, 24 bicyclists were killed in NYC. In the first 9 months of Citibike, 23 Citibikers alone were killed.
No pedestrians were killed by bicyclists in 2012, but in the first 9 months of Citibike, 3 pedestrians were killed by Citibikers.
Not to mention the countless injuries. These are the real stories.
Let's see. Bicyclists run lights, disrespect pedestrians,and flaunt all rules. I know at least the third car will stop at the light!
ReplyDeleteThanks Bloomie. You should have taken the bicycles w/ you!
Anonymous 4:19pm - How many people were killed by Schwinn-bikers? Correlation does not equal causation.
ReplyDelete10:08am,
ReplyDeleteNon-Citibikers killed zero pedestrians in all of 2013. And 14 Non-Citibikers were killed in all of 2013 while bicycling.
Any anonymous commenter can post made-up statistics trying to prove any crackpot point he or she wants. If you can't provide a link to your source, you're full of it, liason or no.
ReplyDeleteBicyclists are the enemy to pedestrians. Maybe they deserve to get hit by the cars! No respect to us, then no respect to those who see red lights as to keep going. Idiots!
ReplyDeleteExcuse me. Oh, another bicyclist going the wrong way, running the lights, going around the trucks in the snowstorm, etc... I see how fast they fly by me on the drive when I run. So, I root for the cars!
ReplyDeleteThere have been zero citibike fatalities and only 3 major injuries. One of them due to the PCP head that killed the flower worker with his car.
ReplyDelete