Edinburgh cycle hire scheme: Bikes could be back on the streets in August

The city council plans to run a tendering process to get a commercial operator to run the scheme at no cost to the council. It will begin as a two-year trial, focused on the city centre, using e-bikes only and a dockless system for parking the bikes.

The council hopes the scheme could launch on a small scale, with 100-200 bikes, in August this year, expanding over the two years to a fleet of 600-800 bikes.

The council hopes to introduce a new cycle hire scheme in time for the Festival. | TSPL

Edinburgh's previous cycle hire scheme, sponsored by Just Eat and run by Serco, came to an end in September 2021 after thefts and vandalism made it unaffordable.

Transport convener Stephen Jenkinson said: "There isn't any funding in the council's budget to deliver a cycle hire scheme for Edinburgh, so I was very keen to see if one could be delivered that was at no cost to the council and ultimately the risk was being absorbed by the providers.

"The council has already held workshops with two potential providers, Dott and Lime, which run cycle hire schemes in other cities.

Cllr Jenkinson said: "The providers we met both confirmed that they're able to get a scheme up and running in a very short timeframe." He said once a contract was agreed, bikes could be on the streets within weeks.

When plans for a new cycle hire scheme was discussed at the transport and environment committee in December, some councillor highlighted a previous commitment to ensure bike hire was available in the poorer areas of the city as well as the centre and argued the council should be ready to invest money to ensure such provision.

And concerns were also voiced about dockless hire schemes leading to bikes being left in piles and causing an obstruction.

Cllr Jenkinson said both issues had been raised at the workshops. "Neither of the companies we spoke to were looking for any form of subsidy or any kind of finance to deliver the service.

"And both companies were comfortable that they had the processes in place to manage any risk to the delivery of the service. I don't think dock-based systems are really part of the operating model any more for these companies."

Asked about a scheme reaching beyond the city centre, he said: "What we're proposing at this stage is a trial. You've got to prove its successful first of all and that the demand is there. I think it's reasonable to have a trial focused predominantly in the city centre of Edinburgh before expanding it out.

"If the demand is there, the scheme will expand through time."