Wash U's Shuttles / Drury Bike Loans

Springfield Bike Sharing

Drury University recently announced that their free bike loan program was an immense success.  Missouri State University announced at the same time that they'd be implementing a bike rental program on their campus soon. 

If the two universities were in isolated separate towns, this news would be great.

 
They are, however, right next to each other, which makes this news evidence of a communication problem. 

What if the two directors of the two bike programs sat down and had coffee together, decided to pool resources for one bike program (perhaps like ZotWheels at UC-Irvine), and allow students at both universities access...  Who would benefit most?   The answer is Springfield.

It'd be like two silos becoming one. 

But what if they made an open agreement with opt-in terms for anybody interested in joining.  Who might join?

Two other colleges are in easy biking distance!

With four institutions of higher ed acting as the pillars of support for a bike program, local businesses might as well step in and let regular citizens participate.  Perhaps that's the direction these two programs may one day go.  Obviously a strong biking culture at any of these four campuses will influence the others.  Furthermore, if all four colleges agree on something, the town will go along with it.

Wash U Shuttles

Silos and turf battles create duplicated effort.  Think, for instance, of a private shuttle with a route similar to a public bus.  In St. Louis, this might be SLU's shuttle and Metro's 70 Grand.  Students ride one bus, regular people ride the other.  Neither service has great frequency or capacity.  SLU's shuttle doesn't just go up and down grand.  It goes in a loop over streets also served by Metro's 8, 80, and 32.  If SLU stopped running a shuttle, diverted the money to Metro, and gave every student a free bus pass, all four lines could gain funding and passengers.  Grand could be made into a proper BRT line.  New bus lines might be added, and SLU would be better because of it.

This is what Wash U did.  Wash U uses MetroBuses instead of shuttles.  Students get the benefit of the entire public transit system.  Citizens get better buses around Forest Park, Clayton, and the Central West End. 

The opt-in idea is established.  The CVC started a downtown trolley operated by Metro.  CVC's tourists get better access to the attractions in Forest Park, Wash U students get a downtown circulator, and citizens get a better city.

Summary,
Silos = Poor Service and Wasteful Duplication
Open Platforms = Synergy, Scalability, and Viability

St. Louis Bike Sharing

Bike sharing systems make sense as scalable systems.  They work well only when the stations are clustered together.  To be successful they demand a density of use. 

If Wash U started a small bike sharing program with a station at the Danforth Campus and one at its South Campus, then Concordia and Fontbonne adding stations between would add flexibility and varied use to the system, which would in turn demand more stations nearby in Forest Park. 

If a station is added at Wash U's Medical Campus, then people would be zipping back and forth across the park all day.  Forest Park Forever, the SLAM, the Zoo, and the History Museum all putting up stations would add to the density of transit options.  Forest Park Community College might join in with the Science Center.

A station at the History Museum might inspire one at Forest Park MetroLink station, which means Metro would be involved, and therefore everyone.  It could telescope out to Belleville, UMSL, SLU, and Webster could opt-in, and eventually SIUE would dump the small private system they have now.

Bike sharing is a form of transit.  Like shuttles, public transit is more effective than private.  If Wash U created a bike sharing system for only Wash U students, then it'd never expand to a critical mass.  Allowing for others to opt-into the system creates unlimited potential and synergy which is better than any individual effort alone.

WeCar

Wash U's car sharing program, WeCar, suffers from the same failure to scale.  It operates on a "one car to one parking space" model which makes it rigid and unappealing for people that live outside of Clayton or Downtown and need to go to places other than the grocery store.  It can only expand as fast as new cars are added to the system, which is slow because of the small user base.

If WeCar operated on a "any car to any parking space" model and ditched the silly booking and gas refilling system, it'd be immediately appealing. 

Imagine an electric WeCar system that operated thus:  I see a WeCar parked in front of an induction charging station, I walk up, put in my pin and slide my card, it opens, I drive off with it, I do my thing, I see an open charging station somewhere else, I park it, and I get out.  An hour later I need to get somewhere, so I look at my iPhone that tells me there's a WeCar parked two blocks away, and I walk to it and repeat the process.

Every business in town would be scrambling to install a parking spot by their front door.  They'd pay WeCar to do it, and the city would be the better for it.