When it comes to the world of bike-share, New York’s Citibike may continue to get the headlines, but it’s actually Mexico City’s Ecobici that has the most users in the Americas. Last week, they proudly released stats about ridership, and the numbers are impressive, especially for a city that isn’t exactly known for cycling (or safe streets).
According to El Universal, Ecobici has reached 95,780 annual members. Of those, 40,500 have been added since December. That compares with NYC being just shy of 80,000, since launching in May. When the Ecobici program completed their 3rd expansion last year, the goal was 75,000 users.Looks like it’s time for more stations.
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| Ecobici uses a Clear Channel system |
In terms of utilization, Mexico City is also the highest for the Americas. While NYC has quickly seen over 3 million trips, Ecobici is now over 10 million.
What makes these numbers even more impressive is that Ecobici is smaller than Citibike (275 vs 330 stations), and does not allow casual use. While NYC (and most other cities) get to rack up the miles with hoards of tourists that can buy passes on the spot, Mexico requires signing up in advance with ID, at off-site locations.
Montreal and DC, the other two major systems on the continent, lag behind in users, although Montreal’s Bixi still has the largest system in terms of stations. Both cities helped in proving that bike-share could be successful beyond Europe, and Ecobici and Citibike may not have been around if it wasn’t for their programs (and of course, the global pioneer, Paris).
Here are some interesting stats:
Stations
425 – Montreal Bixi
330 – Citibike (NYC)
275 – Ecobici (Mexico)
247 – Capital Bikeshare (DC)
Annual Members:
95,780 – Ecobici
80,000 – Citibike
49,000 – Montreal
40,000 – Capital Bikeshare
Highest Trips in a day:
44,000 – Citibike
28,888 – Ecobici
20,000-25,000 – Montreal*
10,000 – Capital Bikeshare
*I’m not finding a reliable number for this, anyone have something more concrete?
See some more Citibike stats here.
See some more CaBi stats here.
DC has more like 22K current annual members… The attrition rate is pretty high.
"While NYC has quickly seen over 3 million trips, Ecobici is now over 10 million."
This comparison is meaningless without adding how long each system has been running. Ecobici: 3.5 years; CitiBike: 3.5 months.
As I mentioned, a huge factor is tourist numbers, which Mexico city doesnt allow
Mexico City does allow tourists to use Ecobici. I rented a bike this weekend for 3 days. I took a copy of my passport to the office and put down a deposit with my credit card. You do have to have a Mexican bank account to do a rental for longer than 3 days though.
Yes, since Ive posted theyve opened it up to tourists. This year they will allow rentals straight from the kiosk. I will be posting about that soon.