If the agreement is approved by the full council, Blue Krewe would begin the process of establishing the bike share program, and would begin operation by Sept. 1 at the latest.<\/p>\n
The agreement lays out a series of wide-ranging objectives on the part of the city, including \u201csupporting equity, safety, connectivity, and efficiency in transportation, while also improving public health and wellness,\u201d according to the agreement.<\/p>\n
The city has begun\u00a0a large-scale project<\/a>\u00a0to expand bike infrastructure, particularly in areas like New Orleans East, Algiers, and Central City.<\/p>\n \u201cReally, when we talk about access to bike infrastructure, and the mayor\u2019s commitment to mobility equity and access, you have to have a bike share program,\u201d said Laura Bryan, the director of the city\u2019s Office of Transportation.<\/p>\n In a presentation at the meeting, Blue Krewe CEO Geoff Coats echoed that language, saying that the organization was \u201ccommitted to bringing equitable, sustainable bike share back to the city of New Orleans.\u201d<\/p>\n Coats was previously the general manager at Blue Bikes. He had been part of the small team that launched the program in 2017 when it was managed by the company Social Bicycles \u2014 later Jump Bikes \u2014 and stayed on as Jump was acquired by ride-hailing company Uber in 2018. He lost that position after Uber\u00a0transferred ownership<\/a>\u00a0of its bike-share program to Lime \u2014 the scooter and bike-share company \u2014 in the spring.<\/p>\n Coats said that over its three years in New Orleans, the operator had racked up 680,000 individual rides for a total of a million miles.<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s really strong local demand and leadership for continuing bike share,\u201d said Dan Favre, the director of local safe streets advocacy group Bike Easy. Favre will be on the leadership board of Blue Krewe. \u201cThe nonprofit governance model for bike share was used successfully in a number of cities,\u201d including Memphis and Houston.<\/p>\n At the Tuesday meeting, Coats said that without a \u201cgiant pile of outside money,\u201d Blue Krewe will \u201chave to put together support and collaboration\u201d from local sources.<\/p>\n \u201cThe loss of that money is our challenge and our opportunity to take back control,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Blue Krewe received seed money and other assistance from the Greater New Orleans Foundation. Blue Krewe\u2019s board president is Dr. Corey Hebert. Its leadership includes Favre; Coats; former deputy mayor and current GNOF CEO Andy Kopplin; Destinie Hammond, the communications manager for the North American Bikeshare Association and a previous marketing manager at Blue Bikes; and Emilie Bahr, a writer and urban planner. All live in the New Orleans area.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m very psyched about the shift in the way that we\u2019re thinking about how it\u2019s governed, in terms of this locally based nonprofit,\u201d Favre said. \u201cThe impact of those decisions are all borne by people who work here, live here, and move around here. And that\u2019s a very different institutional mindset than the big money, VC-backed endeavors that we were working with before.\u201d<\/p>\n New Orleans hasn\u2019t had a bike share on the ground since March, when Blue Bikes were pulled from the city, initially as a response to the coronavirus crisis. Later following the transfer to Lime in the spring, it became more clear that it was\u00a0unlikely they were coming back<\/a>.<\/p>\n The bikes themselves were left in limbo in two warehouses along the Lafitte Greenway, and the program laid off most of its local employees, leaving only a skeleton staff.<\/p>\n In other cities,\u00a0tens of thousands<\/a>\u00a0of Jump bikes were destroyed en masse, although some were donated to community programs in New York and\u00a0Mexico City<\/a>. Lime rebooted the Jump bikes in a few select markets,\u00a0including Denver<\/a>, but its business model revolves\u00a0largely around scooters<\/a>.<\/p>\n At the time, Laura Bryan, the director of New Orleans\u2019 Office of Transportation, told WGNO that the city had \u201crequested to both Uber and Lime that bikes are not removed until the next steps are finalized.\u201d<\/p>\n Around that time, the city reached out to Greater New Orleans Foundation to work with Uber to secure the bikes as a donation.<\/p>\n Those talks fell through, said Favre in an interview, at the same time as Lime was asking the city to accept shared scooters.<\/p>\n \u201cThey more or less said \u2018We\u2019ll keep doing bike share, but you\u2019ve got to let us have two or three scooters for every bike that we operate,\u2019\u201d he remembered.<\/p>\n \u201cWe thought Uber and Lime had figured it out together, but apparently Lime came in at the last minute and just pulled the rug out from under all of it.\u201d<\/p>\n Lime communications could not be reached on Wednesday.<\/p>\n Bryan said that there were \u201ca number of sticking points\u201d in the donation process, including how the bikes would be modified for reuse, but didn\u2019t want to comment further.<\/p>\n But, Favre said that Bike Easy, GNOF, and the city still shared an interest in creating a local bike share.<\/p>\n \u201cWe have so many of the assets in place here. The bikes are gone, and that\u2019s kind of the expensive one, but there\u2019s still the institutional knowledge, all the data that shows that bike share is a proven solution for New Orleans. A bunch of the pieces are there.\u201d<\/p>\n Right now, there are a number of details to be fleshed out, although Coats says that the system is likely to be similar to Blue Bikes in broad strokes.<\/p>\n The contract stipulates that by September 1, Blue Krewe will need to provide at least 350 bikes, locks, and enough dedicated racks to hold at least 575 total bikes. Coats said in a follow up email that Uber had donated the existing Blue Bikes racks to Blue Krewe, and that they would count towards the requirement. (The city provided right-of-way for those racks.)<\/p>\n \u201cOur intention is to encourage the bike-share program to link directly\u201d to the city\u2019s existing bike equity index, Bryan said. Ideally, the city would like the coverage area to extend beyond that of Blue Bikes \u2014 which were concentrated in the city\u2019s tourism-heavy core.<\/p>\n Favre said that the specifics of what bikes will be used, and where they will come from \u201chas not been hammered out yet,\u201d although he estimated later that the price tag would likely be in the low millions of dollars.<\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s a big part of what the CEA enables,\u201d he said. \u201cOnce things get settled between Blue Krewe and the city, that really gives Blue Krewe the authority to go out there and dig in with vendors to test them out, and eventually select one. We\u2019ve already started doing that shopping, but it can only go so far before we\u2019re the authorized operator.\u201d<\/p>\n The contract leaves open the possibility that Blue Krewe will use e-bikes, and Favre said in a text that \u201cthe data is showing more and more that they\u2019re the most effective for widespread uptake of bikeshare.\u201d<\/p>\n However, said Coats, \u201cWe\u2019re looking at placing an order sooner rather than later,\u201d although once the order is in, manufacturing and shipping uncertainties caused by the pandemic make it harder to estimate arrival times.<\/p>\n Fares are also yet to be determined. Blue Krewe will be required to provide low-income, monthly, and pay-as-you-go plans. The low-income fares will require approval from the city, while modifications to other fare types will only be subject to recommendations.<\/p>\n The contract also gives Blue Krewe the authority to create \u201cadditional fare types,\u201d specifically identifying \u201cuniversity fares, convention bulk rates, and variable fare structures that incentivize user distribution.\u201d<\/p>\n Blue Krewe is obligated to reinvest all revenue back into the program, and Kopplin of GNOF said that means that if things go well, those revenues will be used to expand the network and lower fares.<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s no venture capital funder who has to get paid back,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Bryan said that it was too early to say exactly what the city would be looking for in reviewing fare changes, but that \u201cwe want to make sure that our residents feel represented, whatever that means.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe haven\u2019t done this yet, so we\u2019re working in a new operational situation. And I think what\u2019s most important is that our residents continue to have access to the board.\u201d<\/p>\n But, Coats said, equity isn\u2019t just about the fare. \u201cWhen we talk about equity, how do we talk about it on both sides of the equation?\u201d A number of tech-backed bike share companies have outsourced much of their labor to gig workers, he noted.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re also looking at it from the side of our operations. The people who work for us, can they rent apartments, afford healthcare?\u201d<\/p>\n Bryan also said that the city would partner with Blue Krewe to apply for grants that would cover some costs.<\/p>\n \u201cFederally, there\u2019s some grant opportunities where the municipality has to apply,\u201d she said. She said the city didn\u2019t have specific grants in mind yet, but that it was working with the Regional Planning Commission to find opportunities.<\/p>\nLosing Blue Bikes<\/h2>\n
What will it look like?<\/h2>\n