NEWS
The City Council has rolled out hundreds of free helmets in a bid to get the wobbly CityCycle scheme back on a steady course – and it's one of a handful of initiatives that the councill opposition claims is simply pouring good money after bad.
Cr Quirk believes the 400 free helmets now attached to bicycles as part of a three month trial will be made it easier for people to access the CityCycle scheme.
Other initiatives announced recently by the Lord Mayor include
• A cut a daily subscription from $11 to $2 and the introduction of an $11 weekly subscription.
• the introduction of corporate subscriptions
• express cards to allow instant access to the scheme for new subscribers
• a new web mobile site, and
• a fast tracing of terms and conditions to join the scheme.
“Providing 400 courtesy helmets with CityCycle bicycles will make it easier for users to take a spur of the moment trip without having to remember to bring their helmet,” he said.
“Feedback indicates that subscription costs, access to helmets and the subscription process have been barriers to more people subscribing to CityCycle, so we’ve focussed on these issues when developing these improvements.
“I want to remove the barrier to spontaneous trips by having helmets available on bicycles and hope that people will not abuse that trust,” he said. “We will monitor the trial and see if it is viable to continue.”
But the ALP’s Brisbane Lord Mayoral candidate Ray Smith says the Quirk administration “needs to stop throwing good money after bad on CityCycle”.
“Ratepayers are already paying millions of dollars each year to prop up this scheme, while council’s debt is spiralling out of control and services are being cut in the suburbs,” he said.
“This bike hire scheme is already costing ratepayers $10 million, when it was supposed to be cost-neutral. “The changes will do nothing to bring down the cost of this scheme for Brisbane ratepayers, who are saying loud and clear that they don’t want to see any more of their hard-earned money wasted on this scheme. “The Lord Mayor needs to stop dithering and halt the roll out of this scheme until he can get it right and it stops costing ratepayers more money.
“There are hundreds of CityCycle bikes sitting idle on Brisbane streets every day and by the end of this year, Brisbane ratepayers will be paying out over $20,000 per week to operator JC Decaux, just to have yellow bikes sitting on the side of the road gathering rust and dust.
“This scheme is a clear example that this administration has their priorities wrong for our city, and they’re incapable of spending ratepayers’ money wisely,” Mr Smith said.
Cr Quirk said: “These initiatives I have announced will be at a fixed cost of $18,000 for helmets, express cards and software changes that will be paid for by a reallocation of marketing funds within the CityCycle budget,” he said.
“There will be no additional cost to ratepayers and JCDecaux will bear the liability for any possible reduction in subscriber costs.”
Cr Quirk said the enhancements were developed by council in partnership with JCDecaux. He said daily trips had increased as more CityCycle stations opened around the city.
The average of 1300 weekly trips in the first seven months of the scheme rose 50 per cent to about 2,000 since the 100th station opened in May. There were more than 65,000 trips since the scheme began in October last year with about 6,000 subscribers.
