via DDOT
“Dear PoPville,
Are there different rules for where (in terms of geographic zones, not sidewalk vs traffic lane) one can ride regular versus electric capital bikeshare bikes in the district?
I used to commute daily as a capital bikeshare member, but now that I live in Van Ness, I only use the system on the rare occasion that I feel like chancing my safety on the bike-lane-less CT Ave corridor. This evening I juuuust missed an L2 home after dinner in Adams Morgan, and so I went to the nearest bikeshare station and picked up the only thing available – an e-bike (my first ever ride on one). I then proceeded to stow my phone away safely (notifications silenced) and ride straight up to the docking station across from Bread Furst. I docked the bike with a happy little green light, walked the rest of the way home, and pulled out my phone – which displayed a several-minute-old push notification from the Lyft app that I was “outside the allowed area” (or some such) and needed to return immediately.
In my freaked-out haste to figure out what the heck this meant, I tapped into the notification before screenshotting it, but upon opening the Lyft app I was just brought to the default Home Screen. Several minutes later I received a very normal emailed receipt from capital bikeshare. So my question is… was this a fluke? Like, a system error? Or did Lyft try to tell me that I was riding somewhere outside the permitted boundaries and if so, do I need to worry about doing that again during future rentals? I’m so confused. Why didn’t the notification (if it was intended) come from capital bikeshare’s own app? If I somehow broke the rules, what in the heck are they and how does one go about finding them? Why did the ride complete normally afterwards?! Why isn’t there ANY documentation about this on their website?”