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Uber Bike – A New Way to Commute or Explore

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Re: Uber Bike – A New Way to Commute or Explore

#151

Post by ccozan »

bdamm wrote: post #147
mmahemoff wrote: post #38

There's a lot of room for improvement over the new wave of bike startups. I had shockingly bad experiences with OBike - extremely inaccurate locations for their bikes, broken seat, zero response from support when I explained I couldn't lock the bike, and apparently no restrictions in the whole country, so bikes end up all over the country as well as in people's residences or workplaces (not to mention canals and rive…

I loved riding OBikes around Singapore when I was there for a week last year. They seemed to cluster in surprisingly useful places. However, the difficulty they are having with maintaining the fleet quickly became clear as I'd wander down the street to test bike after bike to find one that had working pedals, seat, and handlebars.

I had recently a really bad experience with a Deutsche Bahn bike in Munich. I needed a quick ride and I took really the first one. After 100m the bike almost desintegrated and to my luck, I ended up on the sidewalk and not on the adjacent street ( running with cars at full speed - heh, Mittlere Ring! ). Result: Shoulder injury, 3 weeks of spitalization. Nothing to do, since the TOS requires that you check the bike and report it if broken.

Re: Uber Bike – A New Way to Commute or Explore

#152

Post by deanclatworthy »

icebraining wrote: post #88
mmahemoff wrote: post #38

There's a lot of room for improvement over the new wave of bike startups. I had shockingly bad experiences with OBike - extremely inaccurate locations for their bikes, broken seat, zero response from support when I explained I couldn't lock the bike, and apparently no restrictions in the whole country, so bikes end up all over the country as well as in people's residences or workplaces (not to mention canals and rive…

Regarding the full docks, Hamburg (StadtRAD) has a nice system: you still have to go to a dock, but if it's full, you can lock it by itself and leave it there. Having previously tried JCDecaux's system in Paris and Brussels, it was a pleasant surprise.

This is how it works in Helsinki too. Except half the time, one bike isn’t mounted properly and it thinks it’s not full. This happened enough times for me to ditch it and use my own bike, especially after the city didn’t address the feedback they had regarding the issue.

Re: Uber Bike – A New Way to Commute or Explore

#153

Post by dschep »

mmahemoff wrote: post #38

There's a lot of room for improvement over the new wave of bike startups. I had shockingly bad experiences with OBike - extremely inaccurate locations for their bikes, broken seat, zero response from support when I explained I couldn't lock the bike, and apparently no restrictions in the whole country, so bikes end up all over the country as well as in people's residences or workplaces (not to mention canals and rive…

In DC we also have JUMP (tho this Uber integration seems to be SF only), in addition to ofo, spin, mobike & limebike. And in my experience JUMP doesn't suffer from the majority of the issues the other dockless providers do. Their bikes are much higher quality and lock to something. This quality comes at a price, so the provider is more invested in bikes remaining in operation, whereas the other providers' bikes are so cheap that the companies treat them as disposable leading to most of the problems.

Re: vans -- dockless providers do this too (at least in DC, where they're required to)

Edit: and since this is HN, I've gotta point out that JUMP is also the only dockless operator in DC with an easy to use & publicly accessible API.

Re: Uber Bike – A New Way to Commute or Explore

#155

Post by bigfudge »

mmahemoff wrote: post #70
notyourwork wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Mobike seems like they have their heads more switched on, but the seat on current models is so low that their bikes (in London at least) are barely usable to anyone at average adult height or above. Are you not able to adjust the seat? Considering the varying heights of people this would seem like a standard expected feature.

You can a bit, but the max height is still absurdly low. Where Boris bikes will probably allow a 190cm tall person to be comfortable, these probably max out around 170cm tall before you're feeling the pain.

I'm 202cm and they're fine for me. Was amazed the first time I tried

Re: Uber Bike – A New Way to Commute or Explore

#156

Post by t_fatus »

icebraining wrote: post #88
mmahemoff wrote: post #38

There's a lot of room for improvement over the new wave of bike startups. I had shockingly bad experiences with OBike - extremely inaccurate locations for their bikes, broken seat, zero response from support when I explained I couldn't lock the bike, and apparently no restrictions in the whole country, so bikes end up all over the country as well as in people's residences or workplaces (not to mention canals and rive…

Regarding the full docks, Hamburg (StadtRAD) has a nice system: you still have to go to a dock, but if it's full, you can lock it by itself and leave it there. Having previously tried JCDecaux's system in Paris and Brussels, it was a pleasant surprise.

the new system in Paris allows this now.

Re: Uber Bike – A New Way to Commute or Explore

#157

Post by rconti »

ISL wrote: post #97
bunderbunder wrote: post #73

How do people who've used it feel about the dockless iteration of bike sharing? I've never had occasion to try it, but I'm very skeptical. It seems like letting people leave the bike more-or-less wherever is optimizing the end-of-ride experience at the expense of pretty much every other part of the operation aside from actually riding the bike. I don't think I'd want to start my morning commute by hunting around in a…

Dockless bikes in Seattle, in my experience, are a net win. The downsides really are only haphazardly-parked bikes and large aggregations of bikes in popular destinations. When those aren't problematic, it's great.

eg, at the waterfront, not uphill.

Re: Uber Bike – A New Way to Commute or Explore

#158

Post by rconti »

yesimahuman wrote: post #137

Sounds like Donkey Republic which I used (and enjoyed) in Denmark. Nice that you can find/return a bike anywhere (not just in a designated rack). Looking forward to doing this in the states

I used Donkey Republic in Munich and rather liked it; the bluetooth lock functionality was pretty cool.

I used another vendor in Vienna but the experience was very 3rd world. The location of the bikes was only approximate (the first 2 locations I looked had no evidence of any bikes; thankfully the 3rd location had 2 bikes). They weren't maintained, and the app just gave you a code to a cable lock which means I could lock it after ending my ride, then someone else could come along, use the same code, and the vendor would assume I was lying about where I left it. Billing was handled through some sketchy place in Florida. I wish I could remember the name.

Re: Uber Bike – A New Way to Commute or Explore

#159

Post by mrmrcoleman »

Page seems to have been moved:

"Sorry, we couldn’t find that page We’ve moved a lot of stuff over the years, and it must’ve gotten lost in the mix. Please try retyping the address or just head back to our home page."

This is the best link I could find with a quick search: https://jumpbikes.com/uber-bike

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