Cycles dumped: Balmoral hills too steep for share bike riders
CYCLISTS are ditching their share bikes at Balmoral Beach as they don’t want to cycle back up the hill, a Mosman councillor says.
Mosman
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SHARE bikes are being dumped around Balmoral Beach because cyclists don’t want to pedal back up the hill, a councillor says.
The streets leading down to the beach are notoriously steep and Cr Libby Moline has noticed the problem develop in recent weeks.
“What is happening is they ride them down the hill and they don’t want to ride them back up,” Cr Moline said.
“You would have to be a pretty good cyclist to go up Awaba or Raglan.”
Cr Moline has noticed the bikes lying in the park, left against walls or knocked over on the ground.
She is concerned that as the summer approaches the issue is going to get worse.
“It’s created quite a bit of anger around the place,” Cr Moline said.
“The (bike share companies) are not taking responsibility for their bikes. They are running a business but (the bikes) are being dumped. If we dumped rubbish outside our house the council would fine us.”
Cr Moline believes the bike share companies should have dedicated racks where customers can return the bikes. There is a similar system in operation in New York where cyclists pick up a bike from one of hundreds of stations around the city.
She said if the bicycle is not returned to the rack the customer would continue to be charged and this would help prevent dumping.
In neighbouring North Sydney Council, the share bikes have also become a problem for residents.
The council has received a number of complaints mostly about bikes that have been left in inappropriate locations.
“Council will contact the bike share operator in the first instance to arrange removal of the bikes if we receive reports of them being dumped,” a spokeswoman said.
The council is urging people to report the bikes directly to the share companies. If the bikes are not removed council is putting in measures to impound them.
Share bike company Reddy Go said it has noticed a few bikes around Balmoral Beach and it is continuously checking their movements.
“Shared bikes work in a way that they could be parked anywhere safe and legal,” a spokeswoman said.
“They are not dumped, they’ve been ridden and parked by user, waiting for the same or other users to collect and ride to somewhere else.”
The company said that dockless bikeshare has some teething issues and it is committed to working with the community.
Rival company oBike says it has a maintenance man who goes to Mosman regularly.
“We have been ramping up our operations on ground and have always strived to redeploy indiscriminately parked bikes within 24 hours,” Lim Chee Ping, Head of oBike Australia said.
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