Published September 20 2017
Colorful bicycles from bike share services operating elsewhere already are showing up on downtown streets. Against that backdrop, Bellevue will host an Eastside Bike Share Vendor Fair to explore the public’s interest in privately-run, bike share services on the Eastside.
The event takes place from 5 to 7 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 27, at Bellevue City Hall. Elected officials, community and business leaders, and interested members of the public are invited to attend this free, informational event.
Six bike share companies from across North America and two from China are expected to have representatives available at the vendor fair to demonstrate their products and answer questions. The companies are LimeBike, Gonbike, Gotcha Bike, KoloniShare, ofo, Spin, VBikes and Zagster.
Bellevue Transportation Department staff and their Eastside partners will be present to describe how bike share could expand local transportation choices. The vendor fair is a collaboration between Bellevue, Issaquah, King County Metro, Kirkland and Redmond.
“We’re committed to providing people a variety of travel options, and bike share could be part of the mix,” said Transportation Director Dave Berg. “We support bicycling and value innovation, so the vendor fair is a good opportunity to learn how one or more of these operations might work here in Bellevue.”
Also available is an online survey seeking the public’s input about bicycling in Downtown Bellevue, their familiarity with bike share in other cities, and their level of interest in seeing bike share come to Bellevue. The survey will remain live through October 20.
Over the coming months, Bellevue staff will meet with business groups and other organizations to consider how to make downtown a more comfortable, safe, and attractive place for people to bike. The process will include consideration of whether, when, and how to permit privately-run bike share, as well as options for introducing the first high-comfort bikeway to downtown through a demonstration project.
The city is not considering investing local resources to own or operate a bike share system. More information is available on Bellevue’s Bike Share webpage.