As BCAA celebrates expanding its Burnaby Mountain e-bike service, the city is pondering what a citywide e-bike share would look like.
David Holzer, business development manager at BCAA’s Evolve e-bike share program, told city officials the program has recently expanded to the UniverCity neighbourhood, according to his presentation at the city’s transportation committee Jan. 22.
Three new parking stations have expanded e-bike share access to 4,000 UniverCity residents, Holzer said.
He said the program at SFU sees plenty of use because the back-and-forth trip from one end of the campus to another is very short.
“We can service that area with a small number of bikes because they’re not in use for significant periods of time,” Holzer said, noting the program on Burnaby Mountain has seen “tremendous success.”
The program costs $1.25 for an unlock fee and 35 cents per minute. Users can also purchase a $10-a-month package that buys down the per-minute price to 10 cents.
Committee members expressed interest in more e-bike and e-scooter sharing programs throughout the city.
Coun. Daniel Tetrault asked if BCAA has plans to expand to other parts of Burnaby.
“Of course, we would love to,” Holzer said. “We’re a Burnaby-based company. Our headquarters are on Canada Way. We would love to service Burnaby.”
Holzer said Burnaby has “quite a bit of potential” for a successful bike share program, due to its dense, multi-use neighbourhoods.
“Your traffic and your robust public transit and rapid transit links really lead to Burnaby being a really excellent opportunity for bike share or shared mobility to succeed,” he said.
The city’s director of transportation, Amy Choh, said staff are currently working on a public bike share program and will seek feedback from the transportation committee and council later this year.
If council approves the plan, staff would invite vendors to bid in a fair procurement process.
E-scooters in Burnaby?
Holzer said e-scooters are becoming even more popular than e-bikes.
He said some municipalities are seeing six times more usage on an e-scooter than an e-bike.
While Burnaby is currently not a part of the provincial pilot program allowing e-scooters, Holzer said the program has become more streamlined for cities to opt in.
BCAA research indicates e-bikes tend to fit longer trips in the five-kilometre range, while e-scooters fit the shorter trips of around less than three kilometres, according to Holzer.
“In Burnaby, I think that it would be great to have both, to be honest,” he said.
“I think you would then have a full suite of shared mobility products that you’re offering your citizens and encouraging them, in more ways than just one, to move away from using their car or link more into transit.”
