Cycle sharing is back to drive virus scare away

Chennai

“As these smart bikes help the public maintain social distancing while commuting, we have resumed the services at 10 locations with 100 bicycles since June 8. We will open the remaining 69 smart bike docking stations in a phased manner as per demand,” said Ranjit Srivastava, vice president (Marketing), SmartBike Mobility.

The officials, however, said the patronage at present was very less. “In Chennai, the patronage was always good. We have done about 1.26 lakh rides since our launch. Before the lockdown, there used to be 500 to 600 takers on weekdays and 900 to 1,000 on weekends. Now our patronage is less as the public is still fighting corona scare,” Ranjit said.

Pointing to the global phenomenon of people preferring private mode of transport over the public transport to avoid crowding, he pointed out that bicycles are the best way to keep social distancing and only one person can ride on these smart bikes. He said as part of preventing virus spread, the smart bikes would be disinfected daily. “We are also trying to work out plans to disinfect the cycle after every ride,” he said.

Ranjit said they have expansion plans for the post-COVID phase. “We would be increasing the docking stations from 79 to 150 in the city and would be introducing additional 1,000 smart bikes including 500 e-bikes. We are identifying locations for the docking stations in consultation with the corporation,” he said, adding the mandate was to set up docking stations in 500 locations in the city and deploying 5,000 bicycles.