Contaminated rivers or soils, abandoned industrial waste… Do you live near a polluted site?
Click here to alert us!
–
Unlike their Parisian ancestors created more than 10 years ago, the Citi Bikes waited until May 2013 to be launched in the famous American city. Still, their success has been dazzling in this city of 8.5 million inhabitants since 53 million uses have been recorded in 4 and a half years.
New York is today the American city where cycling is developing the fastest. 12% of the adult population cycles regularly, which represents 780,000 people. Of that number, there are 245,000 Citi Bike users.
The inhabitants of the city realized that there was no more room for more cars. And the development of shared bicycles gives New York the image of a city concerned with the environment. This makes it attractive, especially to young workers.
Bicycles are making a place for themselves in New York by taking the 450 km of cycle paths developed in less than five years. However, this remains insufficient and New York cyclists are forced to move on axes that are not made for them at the start. Bridges, tunnels, avenues congested by buses, trucks and 4X4s, not to mention potholes in the hundreds of thousands.
Safety is the big issue with Citi Bike and bikes in general. The year 2016 ended with 18 deaths and 5,000 injuries. New Yorkers say they are scared when they cycle. They all know someone they know who has been in an accident.
Faced with this scourge, there are free courses to learn tricks to avoid accidents, including the non-stop use of the bell, respect for traffic lights and the highway code.
Despite these obstacles, the city of New York wants to develop bicycle sharing because it is still absent from the working-class districts of Staten Island and the Bronx. To deploy this service, the New York Department of Transportation would like a terminalless docking system like those found in Manhattan, Brooklyn and Queens. Bikes available anywhere.
But the detractors of the system already fear that users drop their Vélibs anyhow, in the most incongruous places. In China, where this system widely exists, bicycles are sometimes found in trees and often in rivers …
–
