from Hacker News

If Free Buses Aren't Wise, What About Cheaper Citi Bikes?

by raybb on 5/9/25, 12:10 AM with 9 comments

  • by bberenberg on 5/9/25, 11:18 AM

    One point omitted in the article that matters is that we have two types of bikes. One is a normal bike. If you’re a member, this is free to rid for 45 minutes at a time as much as you want. The second is an electric assist bike which has the prices listed. One of the issues we’re facing is that there is nearly no inventory of the normal bikes. This has taken citibikes from being a reliable and available pay once and ride solution to a solution that often costs more than a subway ride, and sometimes more than an uber. I get that Lyft wants to make money on this, but I think if they want the benefits of a city granted monopoly, they need to better meet the needs of the citizens and be ready for worse control of their business model than they would get otherwise.

  • by extraduder_ire on 5/9/25, 5:32 AM

    The semi-government docked bike rental scheme in my country is free for the first half hour and €0.50 per half hour (or part thereof) after that. (plus €10/year for the account per city, €35/year in Dublin) I don't think I'd use it nearly as much as I would if that wasn't the case.

    I would guess it doesn't generate enough revenue to pay for itself overall, but it's incredibly useful for transit around cities.

  • by rafram on 5/9/25, 4:55 AM

    I do think Citi Bike should be cheaper (and not run for Lyft’s profit), but some of the arguments here are suspect. For instance:

    > Another revenue source? The bill itself. The savings from Mamdani’s free bus pilot led to a 30-40% increase in ridership on those routes. It stands to reason that similar price cuts on Citi Bike would also lead to ridership boosts. Unlike free buses, however, Citi Bike would still get fare revenue with a fare cap.

    We’ll lose money on each ride, but we’ll make it up in volume?

  • by Veedrac on 5/9/25, 8:43 AM

    It's free advice but if you're a part of government and think a service is good and should be encouraged, I recommend not proposing bills whose only contents is making the existing market for that thing illegal.

  • by tekla on 5/9/25, 12:41 PM

    Citi Bikes are already free if you want it enough.