Bike Share is Rapidly Taking the World by Storm Post-Covid

Montreal, Canada, Sept. 30, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) —

• PBSC Urban Solutions expands across Spain, France & Romania with new systems
• PBSC has implemented more than 95 000 bikes and 7500 stations in 40+ cities for over a decade
• Europe’s post-covid focus on zero emissions target enforces the need for bike share in major cities
• Today, PBSC celebrates 14 million e-bike rides worldwide
• PBSC President, Luc Sabbatini, sets sights on the future of the industry as the company brings forth innovation in multimodal & solar charging

Rethinking Transportation & Sustainability Post-Covid

In a post-covid world, the drastic need to re-assess environmental sustainability and healthy transportation are carrying a wave of change in cities around the globe. In response, the demand for reliable bike share and e-bike share systems is rapidly growing all across the world. In quick succession, the last years have seen Dej, Sibiu and Iasi in Romania, Dubai and Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates, Clermont-Ferrand in France and San Sebastien, as well as La Coruna in Spain, among 7 major cities, make the decision to move forward with PBSC solutions to provide a safer, healthier and more eco-friendly alternative to travel by car.

PBSC Urban Solutions continues to play a crucial role in Europe’s ongoing bike share expansion as the continent’s leading docked bike sharing systems provider. Working with partners, such as Itaú (Tembici), Ferrovial and SUMS, PBSC is the name and technology behind successful bike share schemes in Barcelona, London, Valence, Monaco and countless others. It doesn’t end in Europe, either. In 2021, PBSC was recognized by Frost & Sullivan with the Latin American Bikesharing Technology Market Leadership Award for their successful micromobility systems in LATAM.

An Impressive Global Impact

PBSC, originally named as an abbreviation for Public Bike Share Company, has since lived up to its name with over 500 million trips on the company’s bikes and e-bikes. Another core reason for their expansion in numerous European countries is Europe’s Zero Emissions objectives for the upcoming years and the EU’s funding for yesterday’s urban cities to become tomorrow’s smart cities and achieve carbon neutrality. 

In cities such as Clermont-Ferrand in France and Iasi, Romania, the bike sharing schemes will be integrated into the overall public transportation programs available to daily commuters. Combined with bus, train and metro transportation, it has been proven that bike share programs can play a key role as a first and last mile option to encourage people to shift away from travel by car for short distances and day to day trips to work and on errands.

The results of this new way of thinking about urban mobility are best showcased by looking at the fast user adoption behind e-bikes. In Montreal, where the BIXI scheme has played an integral role in daily transportation, a 2020 report revealed that “The average distance of each electric BIXI trip was 70% higher than that of standard BIXI trips (4.8 km vs. 2.8 km)”. Additionally, “On average, electric BIXI bikes were used 60% more often than standard bikes on a daily basis (4.3 times vs. 2.7 times).” 

With similar results being reported in cities in France, Spain, England, Romania and others, it’s not difficult to foresee a quick turnaround on Europe’s carbon footprint, at least in terms of transportation – which is responsible for 27 % of total greenhouse gas emissions in the EU-28.

Besides a wave of growth in the European market, PBSC has seen its systems in North America, LATAM and the Middle East also continue to expand with cities like Toronto in Canada and Dubai in the UAE set to add new bikes, e-bikes and stations in the upcoming months to their fast-growing and popular bike share programs.

 Today, PBSC celebrates 14 million rides on their e-bikes, globally. 

Innovating for The Next Phase of Shared Mobility

This new flood of interest comes on the cusp of PBSC’s own expansion in the world of micromobility to go beyond its namesake and introduce new innovations into the greater world of mobility. With their multimodal solution, PBSC enables cities to accommodate both bike share, e-bike share, and e-scooter share with reliable and secure docking and charging. 

Multimodal charging and docking allow cities to apply stricter regulations to shared mobility systems that operate both privately and publicly as part of the city’s transportation system in implementing stations that can accommodate multiple different fleets and manage them all from one cohesive back-end. Docked and dockless operators that have found themselves at odds will be able to work together in a manner that better serves both the cities and their daily users, without having to worry about batteries.

The micromobility industry has been heading towards multimodality for a while now, with the introduction of a number of apps and partnerships, especially in terms of MAAS. PBSC’s solution will allow multiple operators to integrate their location tracking and rental processes into the same app, as well as the city’s own public transportation app. 

Solar Charging for Sustainability

PBSC is also invested in an ongoing pilot project with Aspen-based WE-Cycle’s bike share program and Skyhook Solar to cut electric bike sharing carbon emissions for our stations and e-bikes with one of the world’s first fully functional solar-powered electric bike charging stations. 

Aspen-based WE-Cycle is moving towards growing their fleet with PBSC bikes in a sustainable way that cuts their carbon emissions. The roaring Fork Valley bikeshare program is piloting two new solar-powered electric bike charging stations with PBSC stations and Skyhook Solar technology. The panels are thin and inconspicuous (mounted 9 feet above the ground in an upward-facing V shape).

Each solar charging station is outfitted with four, 6½-by-3-foot solar panels that charge large batteries in the station’s base. Those batteries, in turn, charge the batteries on the e-bikes. 

 A Leader with a Simple, but Resonating Global Message 

“When we started, the team’s mission was to encourage a new way of thinking about transportation and to help cities grow their bike sharing programs in a sustainable way based on their needs. It’s important that each city that implements our bike share system is able to customize and expand it successfully, while measuring its impact – both environmentally and in terms of how it’s working in relation to their buses, trains, metros.  

Today, we call it 15-minute cities – the idea that public transportation allows for people to get around for all their daily commutes quickly and efficiently. Each city is unique, especially in Europe, every place has its own identity. Countries like France have a long-standing cycling culture and micromobility is a natural extension of that, while Barcelona has quickly become one of the world’s biggest success stories in bike share! 

Our team is fiercely passionate about our mission, has been fully dedicated for over a decade now, and continues to actively look for ways to improve and innovate. The latest is multimodal technology and e-bikes. I’m very proud of our team and what we have achieved, alongside our partners and the more than 40 cites we support with our systems. The world is always evolving and so is the PBSC brand. However, our mission always remains the same – We want to change the world, one city at a time.”

– L.S., President of PBSC Urban Solutions. 

• PBSC’s Multimodal Solution