A few weekends ago I decided to leave the increasingly gray city of Stuttgart for a bit of cultural intra-venus. I took a night train to Vienna, where I spent three days museum hopping and indulging in Viennese pastries and whipped cream topped coffee laced with liquor. Somewhere between the high art and the rich dessert, I found time to explore the Vienna bike share program, called Citybike.
The second time's a charm
One of the oldest of its kind, it was originally launched in 2002 under the name Viennabike. However, the system faltered due to vandalism and theft. This is rather unsurprising given that the bikes locked into the stations with a mechanism similar to that of a supermarket shopping cart, with the use of a coin. It was taken over and rebranded by the marketing firm Gewista in 2003. A little digging revealed some interesting tidbits about this company. Originally founded in 1921 as a part of the city government to market the transportation sector, it has since developed into a private marketing company specializing in advertizing on public transportation vehicles and in stations. The majority shareholder of Gewista is none other than JCDecaux, the company responsible for the the Vélib' system in Paris. Similarly to Vélib', the financing model is based on advertizing, but in contrast, it is not the stations but the bikes themselves that bear the branding.
My experience with the system was mixed, though overall I would recommend it to visitors of this lovely city. First I completed the online registration, which required my credit card information and charged me 1 euro, which would be available as credit for using the bikes. Unlike the Paris system, this one accepts foreign credit cards, excpet Amex. The first hour of use is free of charge, followed by increasing charges with each hour. The second hour costs 1 euro, but users can get a bonus hour by putting the bike back for at least 15 minutes at the end of an hour. I found the online registration very easy, and it was available in both English and German, though no other languages.
It was effective immediately, so that same day I set out to rent a bike. But first, I cautiously printed out the map of the Citybike stations. I went to the Opera house where I had spotted a station the day before, but to my dismay it was empty! Already I was not wildly impressed with the system’s management. Luckily the next station was only a few blocks away, which redeemed them a little. The bike was very easy to rent. The experience was much like using a bank machine, except at the end of the transaction I got a bike instead of cash. The bikes are fitted with a contraption that seamlessly slots into a catch on the stands, as this photo below illustrates. It connects to the computer system which instantly recognizes that the bike has been returned. Clearly a major upgrade from ViennaBike!
The bikes themselves are state of the art. They are a smooth ride, easy to adjust, and even have a handy basket for ladies with purses, such as myself. Users can also use their phones to check for the nearest free station. I didn't use this feature, since I didn't have a working phone, so I cannot comment on its effectiveness.
Riding the Ringstraße
I happened to be at one of the busiest tourist spots in the city, along the Ringstrasse, which was built in the 19th century by the Hapsburgs when they planned a major redesign of the city. The Ringstrasse is the mother of all complete streets. Though it is wide, it accommodates several different modes and gives each of them equal space and protection from each other. In the middle, cars zoom by, but each lane on the side is dedicated to trams. Then there is a buffered lane with two rows of trees, under which there is a continuous separated bike lane, as well as a lane for walkers. Besides that is another lane for local traffic, and then a wide sidewalk with more trees.
When this street was built it was conceived as a ring around the old city, and along it were built some of the most prestigious institutions such as City Hall, the Opera House, the House of Parliament, the Volkstheater, and so on. This example of early urban renewal heralds the rise of City Beautiful, which similarly changed the face of Paris under Haussman, and later swept across the Atlantic and left its mark on Chicago and Washington DC. This design movement favored monumental buildings on grand boulevards or plazas, in order to inspire civic pride. In this case, they were meant as a monument to the glory of the Austro Hungarian Empire, of which Vienna was the capital. At the time, the two cultural capitals of continental Europe were Paris and Vienna. But while France was in political turmoil with the rise and fall of Napoleon, the Hapsburgs maintained a steady grip of power. Sadly now the city is itself something of a monument to that former glory.
But that aside, the Ringstrasse lends itself well to cycling, and I saw dozens of people enjoying the city on two wheels. Outside of the Ring, the bike lane situation was hit or miss. Unfortunately I was unable to get a comprehensive picture of the state of the bike network in Vienna because there is no publicly available map of it online. That is a major criticism of mine with respect to cycling in Vienna. In a city where bike lanes are not ubiquitous, information about where to bike safely is essential.
What's wrong with it?
Another information misstep on the part of the City was the low resolution of the bike stations map provided online. With the help of another more detailed city map, I was able to establish the vague location of some of the stations, but then I circled around for 10 to 15 minutes looking for them. In a city where the sun sets at 5pm in October, each station should have a distinct and well-lit sign. Their location should be incorporated into the common city map that is given out at hotels, which shows all the public transportation lines and stops.
My harshest criticism of Citybike, however, was the underwhelming number of Citybike stations. The program is small compared to its peer systems in Paris, Lyon and Barcelona. How small? With only around 63 stations, mostly concentrated in central Vienna and along the way to Schloss Schönbrunn, the Hapsburg summer palace, it is 5 to 6 times smaller than those in similarly sized cities of Lyon and Barcelona. In other words, though it is admirable that the city was among the pioneers of such a system, it has been far outstripped by peer cities' and is woefully inadequate to serve the city's population.
That said, the data shows that the Viennese are by far the most important users of the program. While 74% of all rides this year have been paid for with a local bank card, 17% have been paid for with credit cards and only 3% with the tourist card. This may be explained by the comparative difficulty of obtaining a tourist card (available at select hotels and at the tourist information booth), as opposed to registering online with a credit card for a mere euro.
In sum, though the stations and bikes are on par with those in Paris and Lyon, the system has fallen behind compared to its peers. This is all the more surprising given Gewista's affiliation with JC Decaux. Perhaps the parent company should take a closer interest in Gewista's activities. Given that Citybike has been around for six years, it should by now have developed into a much larger system with better and more readily available information for users. The concept of a bike share is to function as a part of its city's public transportation infrastructure. I would venture to guess that few resources have been invested in it. All in all, I had a lot of fun using the system, and I would recommend it for tourists looking for a cheap, efficient, and fun way to see the historic city center. But if you are ever in Vienna, the station at Stephanplatz is hidden behind the cathedral to the North, on the opposite side from the U-Bahn entrance. It took me a while to find it and at least this way maybe you will benefit from my experience.
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