Washington D.C.’s successful bike-share system, Capital Bikeshare, has been a hit recently (I wrote about it here). But to put its success into perspective take a look at the world’s largest bike-share system. Because while Capital Bikeshare is the largest bike-sharing system in the U.S., a massive bike-share system in the Chinese city of Hangzhou makes Capital Bikeshare look like it’s still riding with training wheels.
In the city of nearly 7 million, the bike-share system — started in 2008 — has more than 50,000 bikes. By comparison, Capital Bikeshare — started in 2010 — has about 1,100.
This is not to get down on Capital Bikeshare, only to show that the U.S. cities still have a long way to go in order to catch-up with the world’s most bike-friendly cities.
Here’s more on this world-class bike-sharing system from Streetfilms:
Hangzhou’s 2,050 bike-share stations are spaced less than a thousand feet from each other in the city center, and on an average day riders make 240,000 trips using the system. Its popularity and success have set a new standard for bike-sharing in Asia. And the city is far from finished. The Hangzhou Bicycle Company plans to expand the bike-share system to 175,000 bikes by 2020!
See it for yourself in this Streetsfilm video below:
Amazing stuff.
[Via Shareable]
Photo: Payton Chung/Flickr
