Shared ebikes have become a key part of London’s transport network. From Hounslow to Greenwich, it’s rare to step on to the street without seeing one, and they now facilitate millions of journeys every month. Forest recorded 3m rides this July alone, a new high. Demand keeps rising, and operators are logging ever-higher ride-per-bike ratios, a key measure of how intensively fleets are being used.
This is good news for London, which gains a cleaner, healthier and more sustainable way to get around – one that eases reliance on private car ownership. And, with new research revealing that air-quality improvements driven by the ultra-low emission zone (Ulez)have led to better lung health in children, the benefits of reducing polluting journeys are increasingly clear.
But shared ebikes also draw real criticism. Poorly parked bikes make near-daily headlines, and with good reason. I’m acutely aware of the criticism directed at us and I know this is a problem. Misparked bikes, and the cluttered pavements they leave behind, cause understandable frustration. It’s a nuisance, and – at worst – a genuine hazard for pedestrians and other road users. Especially disabled pedestrians or those with access needs.
Read more:Pau Cubarsí calls for tolerance after Spain’s ex-PM questions nationality of France players
But the solution doesn’t lie in fewer bikes – it lies in answering the crucial question around parking. Other European cities have shown that, with the right infrastructure and planning, shared ebikes can be woven into existing transport systems. They’ve done it by answering one key question: where should bikes go when they’re not moving?
London’s cycling infrastructure has come a long way – the Cycleway network now covers 450km (280 miles) – but our roads are still asked to accommodate buses, taxis, pedestrians, scooters, cyclists, private vehicles and mopeds within the same finite space. If London is serious about making shared ebikes part of its transport network, policymakersneed to rethink how that space is allocated, particularly when it comes to parking.
Paris offers the clearest case study. The administration of the former mayor, Anne Hidalgo, didn’t just build cycle lanes; it fundamentally reconsidered how public space should be used once the pedalling stops. Her administration converted tens of thousands of on-street car parking spaces into Vélib’ docking stations (Paris’s version of Transport for London’s Santander bike scheme) and dedicated bays for bikes and shared micromobility. These, incidentally, also made room for wider pavements and more trees.
Hidalgo’s approach was informed by a simple insight: a single car parking space can hold about 10 bicycles. Repurposed, that space now serves hundreds of people a day instead of storing one stationary vehicle.
London hasn’t yet had this conversation, but the timing has never been better, for two key reasons. First, car ownership in the capital is declining. Almost half of London households no longer own a car, rising to nearly two-thirds in inner London. Yet about 18% of households in inner London still own two or more vehicles.
And, second, as part of the recently passed English Devolution and Community Empowerment Act, TfL has been tasked with designing a pan-London licensing framework for shared micromobility that will finally bring regulation to a market that has grown rapidly over the past five years. It is inevitable that parking for shared mobility schemes will be a key part of that framework’s design.
I see this scheme’s design as a real opportunity to question whether one of the world’s best-connected cities should keep prioritising scarce street space for second cars, over transport that serves thousands of people every day.
For example, if the mayor and TfL converted even 15% of the on-street parking currently taken up by second cars into dedicated micromobility bays, this would create space for almost 1m shared ebikes – far more than the estimated 50,000 already in London and far more than we would ever conceivably need – with every one of them parked on the carriageway, not the pavement.
With help from operators, boroughs, TfL and the mayor, London could solve its ebike parking conundrum in an instant and get on with the most urgent task: integrating them into the transport system safely, sustainably and for the benefit of all Londoners.
