Bike-share ambassador faces tough sell

Russell Meddin has the kind of patience, energy and resolve that make him - depending on your perspective - a tireless visionary or a well-intentioned pest.

The leader of a movement to bring bike-sharing to Philadelphia, Meddin spent yesterday standing outside the University of Pennsylvania bookstore beside a high-tech bike pod loaded with three sturdy three-speeds, available to anyone who wanted to take them for a ride.

Hours passed. Snowflakes swirled around his bike helmet, the arctic wind was botoxing his face, a dozen people stopped to ask questions. A few went so far as to hop on a bike and ride around the block. But most passersby just took a long, curious look, then walked on.

The contraption has a clever locking mechanism built into the rack; two of the bikes were on loan from Montreal, the other bike came from Minneapolis. Both cities will launch bike-sharing programs in the spring.

Although the set-up drew fewer test riders than he had hoped, Meddin said he was confident that eventually the public would embrace his project. And so will the governmental powers who are jamming up the works, he said.

"There are people willing to fund it," he said. "And it would create hundreds of jobs installing, maintaining, and operating the system."

Meddin, officially known as the coordinator of Bike Share Philadelphia, has as his goal bringing 5,000 sturdy bikes to the city, planting them in these solar-powered stations every few blocks, and giving everyone the chance to borrow virtually free, two-wheeled transportation to do errands, visit friends, or just go for a ride.

"The city," he said, "just has to say yes."

A call to the city for comment was not returned yesterday. But Meddin said he had heard from Mayor Nutter, who is interested in bringing bike-sharing to Philadelphia. With the city's budget problems, Meddin reasoned, it has not been a high priority.

Yesterday Meddin's group provided the sample bike-share station so that people could not only see how the system works, but try it out. They will be there again today.

"What's happening here?" asked Dick Ullman, a 69-year-old Episcopal priest from Society Hill who was walking past with his wife, Margaret.

"Have you heard of PhillyCarShare?" asked Rolf Scholtz, a representative from the company that provides the bikes and pod systems to Montreal. Scholtz explained how the automobile-sharing arrangement works. The bike-share program is similar but not related to the auto system.

Members pay a nominal fee to join the network for a year (in Philadelphia the estimate is $40), or by the month, week or day. They receive a key that allows them to unlock any bike from any site, ride it free for 30 minutes, then put it into an open slot at any one of hundreds of pods scattered 300 yards apart throughout the city. To keep pedaling longer, members pay a small fee or play a perfectly legitimate relay game, by parking a bike in a rack part-way to their destination and exchanging it for another, starting the clock back at zero.

"I think it's a great idea!" Margaret Ullman said. "But I'm not going to ride in this kind of weather."

Unlike Montreal, which has to shut its system down for three months in the dead of winter, Philadelphia would be able to use bike-sharing year round, said Braunyno Belo, 20, a representative of Bixi, the Canadian bike-sharing group.

He and his associate were on their knees beside the pod, repairing a connection that made one of the locking mechanisms beep. Despite appearances, the technical glitches have been resolved, Belo said, and major improvements have been made since bike-sharing systems went into operation in France and several other European countries a few years ago.

Vandalism and theft will always be a problem in big cities, Belo said, and the aggressive urban driving culture has to adapt to more bikes on the street. In an attempt to make the public feel more ownership in the program, Montreal ran a contest to name the system (the winning entry, Bixi, is a bilingual take on bike and taxi). That city, he said, also plans to train and then hire underprivileged youth to repair and maintain the bikes.

"We think we're doing something great for society, for the environment, and for people's health," he said.

Meddin nodded, then trotted over to explain how the system works to a Philadelphia Parking Authority agent, who apparently had just ticketed this reporter's car.

A model bike-sharing station will be available from 11 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. today at the Academy of Natural Sciences at 19th Street on Logan Circle.

Anyone who leaves a driver's license can borrow one of the bicycles for a test ride.

Tonight, Bike Share Philadelphia will present videos about bike-sharing programs. The screening will be held at the Academy of Natural Sciences. Refreshments will be served at 6 p.m. and the films will be shown at 6:30.

For more information, call 215-299-1108 or rwall@ansp.org. EndText