“I want to ride my bicycle, I want to ride my bike…..”

“…I want to ride my bicycle, I want to ride it where I like…….”

Not my words…the words of the late, great Freddie Mercury. And yes, you can ride your bike where you like. And as a community, we want MORE people to ride their bikes.

And if they haven’t got bikes, then we want them to borrow one!!

The latest bike share map has just been produced but this time giving the reader an overall worldwide view of this increasing phenomenon. You can take a look at it by clicking here.

According to the map, there are 553 bike share programs in operation worldwide and another 193 in planning or under construction. And they’re not all in Europe or the USA.

The worldwide leader in bike sharing, as measured by the number of bikes, is China. According to data collected by the Earth Policy Institute, 20 of the 25 largest bike share programs are Chinese. The largest scheme in the world currently is in Hangzhou (below) with 66,500 bicycles operating from 2,700 stations.  China’s other largest bike share is in the city of Wuhan, where it has twice the number of bikes as all of France’s shares combined.

But bringing things a little closer to home, if you click on the UK on the map, you will see that there seems to be a distinct lack of little green cycles in the middle of the UK.

Now I know what you’re thinking – here comes another rant. And yes, you’d be right. Here it is….

COME ON BIRMINGHAM CITY COUNCIL !!! WHERE IS OUR BIKE SHARE SCHEME? WHY AREN’T YOU SPENDING ANY OF THAT “CYCLING” MONEY YOU PROMISED? (and breathe…..)

So for now, it’s only those of us that own bikes that can cycle where we like.

Sorry Freddie……