Biketown
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Crowded Biketown station on Belmont Street late on launch day
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| Overview | |
|---|---|
| Owner | Portland Bureau of Transportation |
| Locale | Portland, Oregon |
| Transit type | Bicycle-sharing system |
| Number of stations | 100 |
| Website | biketownpdx |
| Operation | |
| Began operation | July 19, 2016 |
| Operator(s) | Motivate |
| Number of vehicles | 1,000 |
Biketown (stylized as BIKETOWN), also known as Biketown PDX, is a bicycle-sharing system in Portland, Oregon, that began operation on July 19, 2016. The system is owned by Portland Bureau of Transportation (PBOT) and operated by Motivate, with Nike, Inc. as the title sponsor. At launch, the system had 100 stations and 1,000 bicycles serving the city's central and eastside neighborhoods, with hopes to expand outward.
Planning for a modern bicycle-sharing system for Portland began in 2009, under the direction of PBOT. Beginning in 1994, a group of Portlanders experimented with a free community bike sharing system called the "Yellow Bike Project"; the program, inspired by a similar scheme in Amsterdam and operated by the Community Cycling Center, was declared a failure three years later after many of the bikes were subject to vandalism, theft and disrepair.
In December 2011, Metro approved the allocation of a $2 million federal grant to PBOT for the development of a bike share system.Alta Bike Share, a national operator of similar systems headquartered in Portland, was contracted in September 2012 to be the system's operator. The $4 million cost of the system and inability to secure a corporate sponsor led to several delays in the planned launch.
In March 2014, selected supplier Bixi declared bankruptcy, forcing another delay in the system's launch to 2015. Planned operator Alta Bike Share would later be sold to Motivate in October.
In September 2015, the Portland City Council approved a new contract with Motivate to move forward on the bikeshare program. Motivate went on to place a $1.5 million order placed with Social Bicycles to manufacture and deliver "smart" bicycles that include on-board computers and other technologies.
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