NEWS
Pointscoring across the City Council political divide marked the recent first birthday of the much-maligned CityCycle bike hire scheme. Lord Mayor Graham Quirk said that given time, the scheme would prove a success – and revenue neutral – while and the man who wants his job calls it “a complete waste of ratepayers’ money” and has vowed to rein it in.
Cr Quirk argues that the scheme is not fully rolled out, meaning it has not reached a level playing field on which to judge it. It had also been a tough first year with one of the wettest summers in the state’s history and the January floods knocking out stations and RiverWalk, but he was more interested in finding solutions than things to blame.
“CityCycle is about offering people another form of public transport in a bid to reduce traffic congestion on our inner-city roads and while it hasn’t got off to a flying start, 80,000 trips in the first year is nothing to be scoffed at,” Cr Quirk said.
“It’s no secret that something needed to be done to make CityCycle more accessible and we’ve delivered a package of changes that seems to have given the scheme a spark, particularly with daily subscriptions quadrupling since, but it’s still early days. “Let’s not forget a scheme of this size is a first for Brisbane, let alone Australia, and I think CityCycle will grow with pedestrian movements in the CBD set to increase by about 33 per cent over the next 20 years.”
Cr Quirk said to put the total cost of the scheme in context it was equivalent to about one-third of a single road intersection upgrade and he expected it would become cost-neutral over time.
Ray Smith says the scheme’s “continued failure is nothing to celebrate”. “CityCycle is costing ratepayers tens of thousands of dollars every week while the vast majority of bicycles are left unused.
“Anyone with a shred of common sense can see this scheme has been a complete waste of ratepayers’ money,” Mr Smith said. “This scheme was supposed to pay for itself but it’s now costing ratepayers over $2.4 million per year, just to have bikes sitting on the side of the road gathering rust and dust.
“The CEO of CityCycle operator JC Decaux is on record saying the scheme will need 15,000 to 20,000 full-time subscribers in the first two years for it to be successful, but council isn’t even coming close to meeting those targets.
“In his September 2011 Living in Brisbane newsletter, the Lord Mayor admitted there were currently just 1950 annual subscribers to the scheme. “Since day one, this scheme has been plagued by safety concerns, cost blowouts, poor subscription rates and a shoddy implementation.
“The fact that this scheme has needed a full overhaul less than 12 months after opening is a clear admission of failure. “If I am elected as Lord Mayor, I’ll sit down with JC Decaux to stop the waste and renegotiate this contract, because it’s clearly not working under the current arrangements,” Mr Smith said.
