A public bicycle rental system in Greater Taichung will be launched today, Lin Liang-tai (林良泰), head of the city government’s Transportation Bureau, said on Wednesday.
Lin said the iBike system will work in conjunction with the city’s Bus Rapid Transit system, adding that there will be 60 rental stations alongside the bus system within the next two years.
Greater Taichung is planning to cooperate with the YouBike bicycle rental system in Changhua County so that people will be able to rent bikes in the city and return them in Changhua, or vice versa.
Photo: Hou Cheng-hsu, Taipei Times
The decision to set up a platform for the bike rental system in Greater Taichung and Changhua was reached at a regular meeting between the heads of the two local administrations.
Changhua County Commissioner Cho Po-yuan (卓伯源) said that since his county launched its automated bike rental system in May, it has become popular among both residents and tourists.
Cho said that the average turnover rate of a bike in the county is 8.25, meaning that every public bike is used about eight times per day.
Meanwhile that same day, a public rental bike went on show in southern Taiwan’s Pingtung County.
The Pingtung County Government has commissioned Kaohsiung Rapid Transit Corp to design and build the system.
The county government said the system will be launched in October and in the initial stage, 450 public rental bikes will be provided at 20 locations, such as residential areas, schools, parks and government agencies.
The YouBike system in Taipei was the nation’s first, launched on a trial basis in 2009. Since then, New Taipei City and Greater Kaohsiung have also launched their own systems.
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