Photo by Peter McCradySXSW, popularity pedal bike-sharing system to record numbers
As the city of Austin settles down after another South by Southwest Music and Media Festival, bike-share program Austin B-cycle is still riding high from its boost in ridership and popularity.
"Our system got used really heavily," Austin B-cycle Executive Director Elliott McFadden said. "People really embraced it."
During SXSW, the system had almost 18,000 checkouts and averaged about 6.4 checkouts per bike per day. On the system's busiest day, March 14, McFadden said the average was 10.1 checkouts per bike per day, breaking a national record previously held by New York City, where bikes were checked out 7.2 times on average per day.
B-cycle helped accommodate almost twice as many trips during SXSW compared with the first two months and 10 days since the bike-share system's launch, McFadden said.
