BHUBANESWAR: There is good news for citizens and travellers who want a healthy alternative to city-wide travel and sight-seeing. The state capital will now provide the privilege of cycling to all its residents, visitors and tourists on a sharing basis. This will be available at a minimal rental cost to be paid by the user.
Bhubaneswar Smart City Limited (BSCL) has awarded the tender for 1,500 bicycles to two public bicycle sharing companies — Hexi Bikes (1,000) and Yaana Bikes (500). The vehicles will be robust in built and structure and smooth for riding on city roads.
The cycles will be digitally mapped based on GPS locations and will provide mobile app based services to users to locate and use a bicycle. The app will have facility for online payment based on usage.
The Capital Region Urban Transport (CRUT), a Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV), to manage urban transport in and around the city, and BSCL are also developing bike stations across the city, integrated with Bus Queue Shelters (BQS) to provide common infrastructure for the multi-operator model. Deployment and implementations will be completed before Odisha Men’s Hockey World Cup 2018. The docking stations for cycles would cover all areas including heritage area and Info City.
The bicycles will also be fitted with smart locks, which can be opened through mobile app by the users. The PBS users will be categorised into two types: members and non-members. For the first 30 minutes, there would be no charge for members and they have to pay after that as per the fee structure. The non-members, however, have to pay a minimal charge for the first 30 minutes as well.