Is it okay that Prague paid over two million to ride free bikes? | Politics News
Today, 10:49
The pilot project of connecting shared bicycles with Prague Integrated Transport will be permanently integrated into urban transport. Thanks to it, the owners of Lítačka can use a quarterly hour ride on shared bikes for free up to four times a day. You will pay 2.4 million crowns for the trial operation of the city. Is the money well invested, or should Prague have invested it elsewhere? The presidents of the embassy clubs answered this.
Question: Prague has invested 2.4 million crowns in a test operation of shared bicycles with Prague Integrated Transport. Do you think this is well-invested money, or is the city investing elsewhere?
The answers are not edited and are sorted according to the date and time of delivery to the editorial office.
Ondřej Prokop (chairman of the ANO club)
As is customary with the coalition of Pirates and Prague, it’s a nice thing at first glance, but the design is already lame. The test run was in the autumn and winter periods, ie at a time when bicycles are generally not very preferred. Nevertheless, it cost Prague no money, every single kilometer cycled costs taxpayers 2.40 crowns! How much will it cost in the spring? The very loss-making and subsidized Transport Company thus subsidizes the business of several selected private bicycle rentals in a special way. Why didn’t he set up his own bike rental directly? For 2.40 crowns per kilometer, it would certainly pay off. Or will I ask the other way around, why, on the same principle, does the Transport Company not allow private bus operators, which are more operationally efficient, to enter its transmission network? Too many unanswered questions to clearly praise this project.
Jan Čižinský (chairman of the Prague embassy)
In a quarter of a year of the pilot project, more than 13,000 people activated this option in Lítačka, and more than half of them actively use it. In total, people have made over 72,000 rides and 30 new users are added every day. Despite the winter season, it turns out that the combination of shared bicycles and public transport makes sense and people are interested in this service. The trial operation has definitely paid off and the numbers clearly prove it, which is why shared bikes will become a part of public transport permanently. In the end, everyone will benefit – more people on a bike means less people on public transport and on cars on the roads. We run the city smartly based on data to make it truly for everyone.
Viktor Mahrik (Chairman of the Pirates’ Club)
In my opinion, this is very well invested money and the response (of passengers) is more than favorable for the last winter users. See more current numbers. Deputy Scheinherr even said that there should be a permanent involvement of bikesharing in the public transport system, which we welcome.
Of course, the current system also has its flies. For example, operators place bikes mainly in the central locations of the city, because in peripheral areas where the role of bikesharing may have been even more useful, the service does not pay off. It is therefore worth considering whether the provider did not try to motivate the bicycle parking zone outside the wider center.
In conclusion, I would like to say that the bike rental program in cooperation with the city has been in place for some time, for example in Ostrava.
Representatives of the representative clubs ODS and TOP 09 and STAN – United Forces for Prague did not answer the editors’ question.