'Excellent news': Lewisham on brink of new agreement with Forest and Lime e-bike operators
Councillor Louise Krupski, Cabinet member on Sustainable Development, announced the news, noting that user share of rented e-bikes has "rocketed" across the borough.
Councillor Louise Krupski, Lewisham deputy mayor addressed several public questions about e-bikes at the full council meeting on 28 January.
"I very much support this kind of micro-mobility in our borough, its very important to say that user share has rocketed, particularly since the transport strikes," she said.
"They are now part of our integrated transport system .. younger people really do rely on this now and we should be supporting it and encouraging it."
She accepted that there is a problem in Lewisham, "as there is across London", with the companies not fulfilling their duties to pick-up badly parked and abandoned bikes, and she noted the importance of "striking a balance" between the needs of pavement users and other non-riders, and the needs of users who are depending on rental e-bikes.
She announced the council's progress on a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with both operators Lime and Forest, which she said "ramps up the way that we can enforce how the bikes are used within the borough, and clarifies the operators' responsibilities."
Mark Bennett raised a supplementary public question asking what the council was doing to identify problem areas.
"We will now have the ability to pick up bikes that cause obstruction," Krupski said, "and we will be using the data we collect to know what the hot spots are and where there is a problem.
"Where the ridership is at peak demand, so we can put more bays in. That is what our residents are telling us that they want."
She noted that the operators will cover the cost when the council has to pick up bikes.
In an answer to public question for Abraham Crabb, Krupski confirmed that setting up dockless e-bike parking had cost council £237,000 which had been funded by the Transport for London (TfL) Local Implementation Plan Micromobility programme.
This includes one-off charges:
- £116,000 for design and staff costs
- £13,000 for consultations and traffic orders
- £98,000 for implementation
with ongoing maintenance costs of £10,000.
She confirmed that Lime pays the council an access fee of £34,000 per annum, which she said is ringfenced to support transport and highways projects.
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