Subway-Cycle System In São Paulo

Those who use the subway system in São Paulo, Brazil, will have a new service from July onwards: bicycles will be available at the main stations of the city center.

The passengers will be able to use the bikes free of charge for 30 minutes and will pay a small fee should they keep it for longer. To have access to the bicycles, passengers will have to sign up to receive an integration card with the subway system. The goal is to encourage the use of bicycles, instead of trains, for short distances, therefore reducing the number of people on the trains.

More details regarding this initiative, such as the quantity of bicycles that will be available, the stations that will take part in the program, and the fee that will have to be paid if the bicycle is kept for more than half an hour, will be defined in May.

Schemes like this one are already taking place in cities such as Amsterdam and Paris. It will be interesting to see if it will work in a country such as Brazil, where petty theft is so rampant as a result of the unequal distribution of wealth. Infra-structure will also be an issue: although government statistics show that there are more than 60 million bicycles in the country (a ratio of one for every three inhabitants), the lack of cycling paths shows that bicycles are only used as a mode of transportation less than 3% of the time.

Contributed by PSFK’s Latin America representatives Mandalah.