B-Cycle - Denver's Community Bike Sharing Project

The concept of bike sharing has been around in Europe for some time now and personally I must say how much of a fan I am of the idea. Not only is it a step towards a more ecologically sound life style but its a move towards a societal structure where there is more of a common shared responsibility for the way we live. From those of you who dont know how a bike sharing system works you basically pay as you go. A deposit for the bike is taken when you rent the bike (to make sure you return it) and then you pay byt the minute of hour that you have the bike. Returning it to any station once you have used it.

This particular bike sharing system is not the first to appear in an American city but it is the largest (400 bikes) and it's going to be interesting to see how the concept plays out. The interesting thing about this particular project is that it is operated by a non-profit organisation called Denver Bike Sharing. The project is guided by advertising agency Cripsin Porter + Bogusky and the bike sharing system was developed by Trek and includes some awesome little goodies like GPS rout tracking. Check out the video below for more detail:

The project even aims to build a community around the concept by giving each users a personal account page online which will track things like total milage, carbon offset, money saved, calories burned and other trip information. All this info can also be shared via Facebook, Twitter and other social media channels. I really like the addition of community to the system - it really pushes us one step closer to creative a more shared responsibility for a cities sustainability.