Future of Houston bike share uncertain after system shuts down

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The future of bike sharing in Houston remains uncertain after the city’s bike-sharing network, Houston BCycle, shut down in late June. Houston is now the largest U.S. city without a bike-sharing network.

“This is what we feared a year ago,” said Joe Cutrufo, executive director of the cycling advocacy group BikeHouston.

In October 2022, Houston Bike Share, the nonprofit that operated Houston BCycle, informed the city, Harris County, Texas, and the Metropolitan Transit Authority of Harris County, commonly known as Houston METRO, that it would not be able to operate the city’s bike-share network due to declining revenues, rising costs and deteriorating infrastructure. In fiscal 2022, BCycle lost more than $100,000, which did not include nearly $221,000 in depreciation and amortization expenses, according to BCycle’s latest report. Annual Report.

In January 2023, the Houston METRO board approved a measure to transfer BCycle’s operations from the nonprofit to the transit agency, with a greater focus on providing first- and last-mile connections to the city’s transit system. But a few months later, METRO decided not to take over BCycle in favor of creating an entirely new system with fewer stations.

In September 2023, the president and vice chair of the Houston BCycle board published an op-ed in the Houston Chronicle stating that Houston Bike Share would soon cease operations because the organization had become financially unsustainable. They stated that the system’s operating expenses were growing faster than revenues as BCycle expanded to meet the city’s transportation needs rather than focusing primarily on recreational cyclists, who made up 90% of its users. Community impact reported in January 2023. BCycle’s annual ridership peaked at more than 300,000, while the system once operated more than 150 stations, 2,200 docks and 900 bikes across 150 miles of service, according to BCycle’s latest annual report.

In September 2023, the Houston City Council approved $540,000 in funding for Houston Bike Share to continue operating BCycle. At the time, then-Mayor Sylvester Turner said the funding would allow the system to operate for one year. According to press reports, METRO’s new bike-share network is expected to be operational within six months. To that end, the Houston METRO Board of Directors unanimously approved a five-year, $10 million contract with PBSC Urban Solutions, a Canadian-based subsidiary of Lyft, that same month to help build a new bike-share system that would open with an initial 20 stations in 2024 and expand to more than 100 stations by the end of the contract.

Despite the approval, METRO has not signed an agreement with PBSC Urban Solutions, and it is unclear whether the transit agency will proceed with the plan approved by its board last fall.

What changed?

Houston’s new mayor, John Whitmire, who took office in January, has viewed investments in pedestrian and bicycle infrastructure with more skepticism than his predecessor. Turner has supported the expansion of BCycle and the creation of a bike-sharing system operated by METRO. In his first months in office, Whitmire has removal of pedestrian islands and freezing of cycle pathsWith four of METRO’s nine board members recently appointed by Whitmire, some pedestrian and micromobility advocates fear the transit agency will abandon its bike-sharing plans.

In April, METRO Interim President and CEO Tom Jasien, said at Houston Landing The agency is still exploring its bike-sharing options, including potential partners. However, the agency has not announced if or when it will launch a new bike-sharing system. Jasien questioned whether METRO should support a system used primarily for recreation, not transit.

Jennifer Ostrind, acting director of the city’s planning and development department, said her agency will work with METRO on its micromobility plans, but “it’s going to take a little while to get there.”

In the meantime, city officials are dismantling and cleaning up BCycle’s now-unused bike-sharing infrastructure, she said. The city plans to sell the equipment to other bike-sharing systems or dispose of it.

BikeHouston’s Cutrufo said cyclists must rely on other transportation options while the city develops its bike-share plans.

“They were supposed to have a system up and running by the time BCycle was going to go away, and those bikes haven’t even been built yet,” Cutrufo said.