Today, it occurred to me that I had a large number of Lime credits left on my account as they pull their bikes from our streets. I didn’t want to be left holding the bag, so I emailed their customer support to request a refund. They processed it immediately.
If you’re in the same situation, don’t be left holding the bag. You can contact Lime here to request a refund for any outstanding balance you have on your account.
Thanks Bryan — That’s $10 I wouldn’t have realized they still had. They got refund in motion quickly.
Bryan – Jack Prior and I owe you a cup of coffee. It took Lime 30 minutes to get back to me with notice that my refund is in process.
I’m not sure how others reacted to Lime. I never used the powered bikes, but found the pedal bikes too small for my height. I’ve had more luck with bike rentals elsewhere. Our search for last-mile transportation continues!
Forget King Tut. Sounds like we ought to put a statue of Bryan in front of Newton City Hall.
I got my Lime credit back as well. But I also took a look and I did about 30 rides for roughly 20 miles. I used to use Lime pretty regularly when I would go from the Chamber offices on Needham Street to various meetings, often in Newton Centre.
I found it was great for village-to-village transportation.
The common complaint was they were too heavy. The e-bikes were, albeit better , more expensive. I know there are a lot of biking advocates on V14. In my opinion, they are not representative of the overall Newton community. And they all have a bike, many multiple bikes. For whatever reason they would from time to time rent a Lime bike. Perhaps it was an effort to boost their business as it was clear from the start that it wasn’t a successful program in Newton.
I saw very few people riding Lime bikes and they would continually be staged all over Newton Centre and there would be the same bikes in the same place day after day.
There just wasn’t a market for them and when Lime made the business decision that a municipality must offer the e-scooters if they offered the bikes, the hand writing was on the wall
@claire I can only speak for me, but I would use it to fill in blanks, even on days that I had my own bike. I’m not sure of a good way to phrase this, but it enabled transportation without return to a specific point.
For example, I may bike to and from work (round trip) but then use a Lime to go to a meeting in Newton Centre, especially if I knew I would be taking the T back, or going to another destination. I also used it when, for example, I would be meeting someone so we could gather together and in one vehicle to go to a distant meeting. It would allow flexibility in those situations.
I use Bluebikes in the same way. As an example, on a day that the Red Line was particularly crowded and I was going from Kendall Square to Government Centre for a meeting. The bike was faster. Later, when I took the Green Line home, that was the faster alternative. If I had my own car or bike I couldn’t have been as flexible in my transportation choices.
A predictable crash and burn. I hope city “leaders” will think twice before subsidizing another bicycle company with a zero rent deal, and that any similar company will be required to provide helmets for riders.
I get that Chuck but that is too small a niche to be viable. I assume that is why they require municipalities to offer the scooters if they are going to also provide the bikes
Did they pull out of eScooters in Brookline too?
Matt,I don’t believe so. Those are very popular and very profitable. They aren’t permitted in Newton and other cities
Brookline did a scooter pilot that ended in November so they currently do not have scooters. Seemed like a mixed bag, One of the Select Board Members stated that they would likely wait until the State develops scooter regulations before they would consider returning the scooters to their streets.
Please, please, keep the scooters away. A real safety hazard. For those who think they are energy efficient, you might be interested to know that the average lifespan of those scooters is under two months. Think of the energy used to manufacture replacements at that rate.
I could never figure out how Lime could be profitable. Plus, it was annoying to see the bikes placed along public walkways.
So….while available, people don’t use bikes (not enough to make a difference to traffic or the environment) and scooters are dangerous if not detrimental to the environment.
Tell me again how NND and the Wellesley Office Park projects and the thousands of people they will bring won’t turn Upper Falls into a parking lot?
@Paul Levy – yes let’s skip the electric scooters and go right to gasoline powered skateboards. I had one of these for years and rode it everywhere.
Let’s fill the streets with gas powered skateboards that go 25 MPH and have no brakes. What could possibly go wrong?
@Paul there are new scooters coming on the market that aim to solve that problem. They have larger wheels (better for navigating out streets) and a stronger frame. I’d rather see how this concept can develop rather than throwing it out.
Most technologies take a while to truly take hold. Facebook wasn’t the first social networking company and Apple didn’t offer the first smartphone.
Calling bike sharing a failure right now is a bit unfair. This pilot didn’t work, but it’s kind of like putting parking for a person in a wheelchair in front of a building that has nothing but steps, then calling the whole idea of “handicapped parking” a failure because that space is always empty.
We got some great data from this program that shows people will bike given the chance, and we even know where they’ll bike. If we build the infrastructure we can get more people out there. It’s proven in just about every city around the world in every climate.
@Chuck, I’ve seen scooter programs around the world. They are qualitatively different from bicycle programs. Much more dangerous to riders and pedestrians. I don’t see why we need them.
For the record, I was a strong proponent of the docked bicycle program that started in Boston years ago, leading the funding effort for the Longwood area. That’s very different from the undocked program that just ended in Newton.
I’m wondering if people here feel that Lime Bike’s demise is due to an over estimation of how many bike riders (other than simply for sport or pleasure) there are in Newton — or was it just due to the mode of procuring bikes on Lime Bike?
No way to know. Lime’s contact wasn’t just with Newton. More than a dozen municipalities were part of the same contact. And their bikes provided hundreds of thousands of rides in those communities. Was it the business model? The pricing? The market? The company’s own internal financial picture? Labor costs? Etc. Could be any combination or something else.
But it would be speculative at best to decide what this decision says about the possible bike share market in Newton.