Bike sharing for Bixi-less suburbs

Alexander Labayen started his own bike share program, lending out wheels from his large personal collection to people in his neighbourhood. (VINCE TALOTTA/TORONTO STAR)

Nicki Thomas, Staff Reporter

Before Bixi, Alexander Labayen devised his own public bike system.

Stash some bikes near Roncesvalles Ave. Lock one up near Casa Loma. Keep another over by St. Lawrence Market.

“You never know, you might be with a friend and you just want to ride around the city,” said Labayen, 35, the force behind the urban bike blog, 416Cyclestyle.

Since then, Labayen has ditched downtown for Etobicoke. With little hope that Bixi will ever expand to his current community, he’s come up with another way to bike share.

If you’re in the neighbourhood and you need wheels, just borrow some of his.

It’s a pretty informal system. He’s got about 20 bikes parked in his garage, hanging on the walls and stuffed in the rafters. There are a couple of logbooks, where he might write down who borrowed a cruiser and who took off with the training wheels.

Most importantly, it won’t cost you a dime.

“If you have something, share it,” said the married father of two. “It doesn’t have to be on a big scale. You don’t have to have 20 bikes in your garage to do something like this.”

While Labayen brings bikes to his suburban brethren, the city is mulling over how to expand Bixi. It currently has 80 stations between Jarvis St. and Spadina Ave. and from Bloor St. to the lake. A proposal from the Toronto Cyclists Union would see the borders expand to High Park, Broadview Ave. and Dupont St.

City staff has until September to figure out how to expand the program, which recently hit its 100,000th ride.

At question is who is responsible for approving and paying for an expansion — the city or Bixi — and what revenue and ridership targets warrant an expansion.

Andrea Garcia, spokeswoman for the Toronto Cyclists Union, is a public bike share system expert, who wrote her thesis on the topic. She’s never come across a Bixi-type program in a suburb. But she applauds Labayen’s do-it-yourself system.

“We’re all for any program that’s going to increase the visibility or uptake and awareness of cycling,” she said. “We think anything like that is great, especially in areas like Etobicoke where the cycling ridership is slightly lower.”

Labayen said he’s seen the cycling culture in his Markland Woods neighbourhood change over the years. There are more cyclists using the new bike lane on Renforth Dr., more families taking rides through the neighbourhood. He believes that cycling begets cycling, which is one reason he’s keen to have as many people as possible on bikes.

“A lot of silent advocacy is just seeing people riding a bike. If you show people they can do it, then they do it,” he said, adding that it’s also the best way to see your neighbourhood. “That’s all I’m giving people. Another way to figure out the bits and pieces of their community.”

Newbie cycling: Overcoming the terror of the left-turn

I love my cycle to work. It's not too busy, and the majority of the ride I have the comfort of a bike lane to ride in. And it's all right turns.

Newbie cycling: Mapping my way around

As a new cyclist, I'm still very uncomfortable with riding in traffic when I don't have a bike lane all to myself.

The problem is, I don't yet know where all the bike lanes are in the downtown core. I tried checking out the City of Toronto's map, but it's so big and I found it hard to keep track of where everything was. Then I discovered Ride the City.

A newbie cyclist takes to two wheels in the city

Call it Sarah's Cycling Summer

This year I’ve been on a quest to get in shape. My latest challenge? To cycle in the city. The problem? It scares me to death.

Sure, I rode a bike as a kid. But I lost interest when I was 12. The next time I picked up a bike, I was 20 years old and a smoker.

Then it took me 10 minutes to go only a few hundred metres. “What’s the matter with you?” my stepmom asked when she picked me up barely inches from our laneway.

Now I'm a non-smoker living in a downtown condo with a cyclist who thinks it would be neat for the two of us to bike together places.

There's not much space in the condo to store a bike for me, so when Bixi launched in Toronto last month, I decided this would be my trial run. I bought a membership and promptly went out and bought a helmet.

After getting my Bixi key, I didn’t use it for the first time for more than a month. I was too scared. Too scared of the cars, the other cyclists -- of cycling in Toronto in general.

But I want to put my fear behind me. I’m never going to get over my fears if I don’t try.

Last week was my first week. I rode from my house at Queen and Church Sts., across King St. to Parliament St. and down Queens Quay E. It was easy to do when I worked at 6 a.m., but when my shift switched to 9 a.m., that’s when I got nervous.

Still, my first day I went to the Bixi stand at King and Jarvis Sts., and picked my bike. I got on it and began the ride down King — which was quieter than I expected. I turned down Parliament St., to find some unexpected construction. I took my time going through the intersection but survived. I made it to work in one piece.

So here is my quest: To cycle everywhere that scares me by the end of the summer and get my $95 bucks worth from my Bixi membership.

I’m looking for your help in giving a newbie cyclist some tips as I navigate the city this summer. Where to cycle, how to get past the fear of riding on the road with cars and trucks and other cyclists, and how I can improve my balance so when I start after being stopped I don’t wobble around the lane.

Leave a comment and watch as I tour Toronto on my bike.

More bikes needed to help Bixi survive, says bike union

Bixi bike stands are now a regular sight in the downtown core, but advocates say the number and size of the service area needs to expand if bike-sharing is to be the wild success it has become in cities such as Paris. (Rick Eglinton/Toronto Star file photo)

One month in, the Toronto Cyclists Union says the Bixi cycle-sharing program should triple the number of bikes and expand the current service area beyond the downtown core.

The number of rides has increased quickly. “In the first week there were 700 trips; by the last week of May there were 28,000 trips (per week),” said Jared Kolb, director of membership and outreach at the cycling advocacy group. Most of the demand comes from the edges of the service area, along Jarvis, Spadina and Bloor.