Blue Bikes Update: Over 75,000 Trips Taken During The Winter Challenge

From the email:

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We’re pedaling through the final day of the Bluebikes Winter Challenge and ending this month on a high note. Despite the snow, sunshine, and even some rain, Bluebikes riders have taken more than 75,000 trips in February. That’s 30% more than the number of trips taken this time last year.

To celebrate this record-breaking February and the end of the Winter Challenge, join us for the Winter Challenge Rider Meetup, Thursday, March 7th. The event is free and open to anyone who took at least one trip during February. Stop by and pick up your challenge prizes, enjoy great food and music, and meet other Bluebikes riders.

• Where: Beat Brew Hall, 13A Brattle St, Cambridge
• When: Thursday, March 7th, 5:00 p.m. – 8:00 p.m.

If you took a Bluebikes trip, be sure to check your inbox for your email invite and RSVP to the event. Haven’t taken a trip this month? There’s still time! Take one quick Bluebikes trip by the end of the day today, Thursday, February 28th, and you’ll receive an invitation to the party via email. We’re excited to see you there!

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Hubway Is Dead Long Live Blue Bikes

Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts will pay nearly $20 million to turn the Boston area’s Hubway bike share system into Blue Bikes and expand the program with more than 1,000 new bikes and more than 100 new rental stations across the region.

“Blue Cross is committed to helping Massachusetts residents lead healthy lives, and this program is a way to bring that to life,” said Jeff Bellows, vice-president of corporate citizenship for BCBS. “Being a health-care company, it’s in line with what we want to do.”

BCBS will pay $18 million over six years to be the sole sponsor of the bike share system, which will be renamed Blue Bikes. The money will be used in part to fund a nearly 50 percent increase in bikes — by the end of 2019, there will be 3,000 Blue Bikes on the streets, up from 1,800 today — and add more than 100 new stations across Boston, Cambridge, Brookline and Somerville. The expansion will bring more service to underserved parts of the city, Bellows said.

“Communities like Mattapan, Dorchester, Roxbury, they’re going to get additional access to these bikes,” he said. (via)

While I wish it was more of a public system, maybe tax based, but sure I will siphon off some of the obscene profits BCBS is making to fund bike share programs.

The best part of this is that Hubway/Blue Bikes will continue, and it will expand into areas that have not been served by it so far.

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