BikeDC

Photo by PoPville flickr user pablo.raw

“Dear PoPville,

I had a strange but significant situation happen to me on this past Saturday morning, and wanted to get your advice or how would you handle something like this. Saturday right outside of McDonald’s restaurant on H Street in N.E. a young man was offering a bike for sale, he was asking $20 this was for a fully loaded top of the line ‘Giant’ brand bicycle. I thought to myself why is he offering it so low and is it stolen? I immediately thought back to the many times I was a victim of bike theft and thought no way was I even going to think about purchasing this ‘steal’ but how would you handle it? Would you have called the cops, who happened to be within two yards away parked in the parking lot or would you not say anything and walk away? What do you do in a situation like this?”

Photo by PoPville flickr user Mr.TinDC

“Dear PoPville,

I’m relatively new to Capital Bikeshare (within the last year) and have really loved it’s convenience when getting around on the weekends. During the week though, not so much.

My office recently moved to Shaw from Takoma Park. Since I live in Columbia Heights, Shaw is a very easy commute, so I’ve been trying to bike as often as possible. However, I’m a late starter in the morning and usually go to work later than the conventional rush hour. By the time I’m out the door (usually between 9am and 10am), all the bike stations nearby never seem to have a bike available. I’ve emailed the Capital Bikeshare customer support five times since June about their bike balancing and availability after the main rush hour is over. Each time they have either not responded or responded saying that they are “working on it.” While I appreciate them getting back to me, I’ve grown pretty frustrated by the fact that I haven’t seen any progress.

Has anyone else experienced the same issue? Am I the only one reaching out to Capital Bikeshare? Capital Bikeshare is such a great concept but it sucks that my morning bike commute has been so unreliable.”

Ed. Note: We once talked about the scarcity of bikeshare bikes back in 2011. Anyone else notice an improvement since then? Anyone successfully commute using bikeshare? If so, what time do you usually get a bike?

Twelve potential locations for future Capital Bikeshare stations via DDOT.dish

From a press release:

“The District Department of Transportation’s (DDOT) Capital Bikeshare system has experienced a record-breaking year of ridership, with over 1 million rides taken since June 1. With so much demand for bikesharing, we’ve received many questions about when we will be able to add more Capital Bikeshare stations and bikes in the District.

Recently Installed Bikeshare Stations

In June, our Capital Bikeshare operations contractor was able to obtain some much-needed hardware to address our immediate expansion needs. We have installed three new stations in the past few months (at 24th Street and New Hampshire Avenue NW; 34th Street and Water Street NW and at the Martin Luther King Jr. Library). We have also added docks to several existing downtown stations to accommodate rush-hour demand. Our Capital Bikeshare partners in Arlington County, Montgomery County and the City of Alexandria have added new stations as well.

In The Queue

We still have approximately 10 more new stations to install in the District this year and we are working through our placement list to identify 10 of 12 potential locations, which we developed based on member input, user demand and other demographic criteria such as population and employment density.”

Future locations being considered next include:

“1st Street and K Street NE
5th Street and Florida Avenue NE
Division Avenue and Nannie Helen Burroughs Avenue NE
11th Street and S Street NW
14th Street and Irving Street NW
15th Street and L Street NW
17th Street and G Street NW
18th Street and R Street NW
19th Street and G Street NW
Connecticut Avenue and McKinley Street NW
Georgia Avenue and Missouri Avenue NW
Martin Luther King, Jr. Avenue (at St. Elizabeths Campus)”