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London saddles up for new bike hire scheme

How does the London cycle-hire scheme work?

A bike hire scheme designed to encourage thousands more cycle journeys in central London has begun.

So far, more than 12,000 people have signed up to the idea, far outstripping the 5,000 bicycles which will be available at special docking stations.

Transport for London (TfL) has admitted it had been expecting "teething problems".

But it insisted that although members outnumbered the number of bikes, people would not face a shortage.

Already, more than 12,450 keys have been handed out to Londoners enabling them to unlock bikes left at 315 docking points across the city.

The keys cost £3 and the cost of using the cycles varies from £1 for an hour to £50 for 24 hours. TfL and operator Serco expect to roll out the scheme to casual users after a month.

By Thursday afternoon, nearly 11,300 people had signed up to the scheme - with some asking for more than one key.

Members have been advised to activate their keys online or through a call centre. Until they are activated cyclists will not be able to withdraw the bikes from docking stations.

A TfL spokesman said: "We are expecting there will be some teething problems with (the) scheme when it starts.

"This could include some technical issues and we have yet to learn the pattern of how people use the scheme."

The 23kg bikes with three gears do not come with locks and TfL said this was done to deter people from keeping the cycles for long periods.

They are automatically locked at the docking stations.
Oyster for bikes

London Assembly Green Party member Jenny Jones said: "The bikes should have locks and bigger baskets. A target date should be set for people to be able to use Oyster (travel) cards to pay for the bike hire.

"The scheme also needs monitoring closely to ensure that the cost is not putting low-income Londoners off using the bikes."

Docking stations will be available in Camden, City of London, Hackney, Islington, Lambeth, Kensington and Chelsea, Southwark, Tower Hamlets, Westminster and several of the Royal Parks.

London Mayor Boris Johnson officially launched the scheme at 0800 BST in Jubilee Park on the South Bank but the system went live at 0600 BST.

Already one docking station on Portland Place has been targeted by anti-war protesters with large stickers about the conflict in Afghanistan being put on the back of the bikes.

TfL is hoping to reach its target of 6,000 cycles and 400 docking stations later this year.

1) £1 for an hour ..... to £50 for 24 hours
2) The 23kg bikes

1) You can buy a second hand bike for £50

2) 23kg bikes really are going to persuade a lot of non cyclists that cycling is an effortless way to travel round the city - not. I don't think I could lift fifty pounds of bike these days.

They are free to use for the first half an hour....

These things are VERY heavy, can't see people wanting to spend much more than half an hour on one anyway.

Good if you're trying get fit I guess!

I'd call that a low ratio.

Ah, that's because you're a car driver

The numbers on gear indicators suggest the reverse of what you say weepej.

Or an engineer

Those numbers indicate the order you use the gears, starting from rest.

Edit: Sheldon says high gear is big cog up front, small cog up back.
So is it high gear gives you a low gear ratio?