As shared bicycles are widespread around the nation, Hangzhou Public Bicycle System also makes more adjustments, exploration, and innovation, contributing remarkably to the construction of urban ecological civilization. Today’s Echo of Cities will lead you to see why Hangzhou Public Bicycle System can take the lead and sustain.

Figure: Hangzhou’s Public Bicycles

Before the public bicycle sharing system appeared, traffic congestion was severe in Hangzhou, and “the last kilometer after bus trip” exhausted the citizens. Considering such a local situation, Hangzhou integrated “Public Bicycle Sharing” into the urban traffic service system and initiated the first large-scale bicycle sharing program in China to encourage green travel.

The program proposed a new model of cooperation between the government and companies. In the “government calls and companies manage” model, the government invests in the primary system construction, and companies are responsible for the management expenses. The business models of these companies include selling advertising space at bicycle stations and providing convenient public services at service pavilions. At the level of specific operations, Hangzhou’s public bicycle sharing system built a real-time dynamic scheduling management mechanism and assign people to help customers rent and return bicycles during the peak hours in the morning and evening. The program also opened its own official website, hotline, SMS, and Wechat platform to respond to the feedback of citizens.

Figure: Scan the OR code on the bike to start a ride

From: zjol.com.cn

When the initiative won the Guangzhou Award, Hangzhou public bicycle sharing system already owned 3,111 service outlets and 78,000 bicycles and served about 300,000 people per day with the free usage rate reaching 96% and satisfaction rate up to 95.09%. If converted by the average distance traveled by riders each day in 2013, the Hangzhou public bicycle system has reduced 137,400 tons of CO2 emissions. That proves the system’s achievements in energy conservation, emission reduction, and the establishment of a low-carbon city. Meanwhile, it’s instrumental in elevating the city image, improving the city layout, and strengthening citizens’ physical health.

Hangzhou’s public bicycle system has emerged in the second Guangzhou Award with its effective low-carbon transport model, setting an example for public transport planning in other cities and becoming a viable initiative to achieve long-term goals of carbon peaking and carbon neutrality worldwide.

Initiative Updates: Ride on the Sustainable Road

During the eight years after the award, Hangzhou’s public bicycle sharing system has also continued to develop, achieving notable success in energy saving and emission reduction. Today, Hangzhou’s public bicycle sharing system has grown to the world’s largest public bicycle sharing project, with a total of 116,000 public bicycles in the city and an average daily rental volume of around 250,000. According to data released by the C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group, from 2008 to 2020, Hangzhou’s public bicycles have been rented out a cumulative total of 1.098 billion times, equivalent to a reduction of 549 million car trips and 1.461 million tons of CO2 emissions.

From: The Official Website of Hangzhou Public Bicycle Traffic Service Development Co., Ltd.

Apart from increasing the service area and the number of public bicycles, Hangzhou took incremental measures in making shared bikes more convenient, such as scanning the OR code to rent and return bikes and returning bikes overnight. Different systems in different areas are interconnected one after another to be combined into an integral part, making it more convenient for citizens to travel across districts.

Although the rise of private shared bicycles caused some impact on Hangzhou’s public bicycle system, the project has continued to enrich its managing model and add support facilities to achieve sustainable development.