The Mayor, José Luis Martínez-Almeida, at a new bike station at Calle de Alcalá 506, on March 6, 2023. EUROPA PRESS (EUROPA PRESS)
Tonight at midnight the new stage of Bicimad, the Madrid City Council’s public electric bike service, goes live. The system will grow from 264 stations to 611 and a fleet of 2,964 vehicles to 7,500. Yes, the expansion will be gradual and although the Mayor of Madrid, José Luis Martínez Almeida, when presenting the operation of these new bikes on January 24th, promised to open 100 new stations and 1,300 new bikes in the first week of March, finally the premiere was 60 stations and 700 vehicles. The first new anchorages are in the districts of Arganzuela, Carabanchel, Chamartín, Ciudad Lineal, Fuencarral-El Pardo, Hortaleza, Latina, Moncloa-Aravaca, Moratalaz, Puente de Vallecas, San Blas-Canillejas, Tetuán and Usera.
How much does it cost?
The Bicimad launch will be accompanied by a four-month free promotion for current subscribers through July 31, five months free for new annual subscribers, and a first half-hour free for casual users. Free does not include the Bicimad Go service, a service that does not require leaving the bike anchored at a station. The prices of this new system, after the end of the free period in June, will be 25 euros for annual subscribers without a card from the Consorcio Regional de Transportes de la Comunidad de Madrid. With a price of 10 euros less for those who have this subscription. For occasional users, the price per 30 minutes of bicycle use is 50 cents.
How to park the new bikes?
Both the new bikes and the new stations will coexist for three months, the time taken by the implementation period of all the facilities. During the coexistence period, the user can use both the old and the new bikes. If you want to park a new bike in an old station, you have to park it in front of a free anchorage without putting the front wheel on the platform. The old bicycles can be anchored in the new stations. To use them, all you have to do is scan the QR code with your mobile phone located on the vehicle’s dashboard through the application. To end the ride, you must close the rear lock that keeps the bike locked, or report the end of the ride through the application.
How do the bikes work?
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Bicimad stations are equipped with a light system: the red light means that the bike is not available or that it has not been properly anchored, the yellow is a temporary light while the system releases or anchors the bike and the green lights up when when the vehicle is stationary for undocking or when properly docked at the end of a trip.
There are two ways to start the journey: with a map or through the application. The user can swipe the Bicimad card or the public transport card linked to the MPass account on the right side of the base or on the padlock side. You can also scan the QR code from the app and wait for the green light to flash. To finish the ride, simply anchor the bike into the base and wait for the green light to illuminate to confirm it’s securely anchored. On new bicycles, the user must not close the lock. It locks itself.
How do I register?
To use the bikes you must download the new application that will be available from March 7th. Once the new service is launched, current Bicimad subscribers wishing to use it will need to migrate their existing account to the MPass system, the post-paid single account system that allows them to use the services of the city’s transport company (bus, parking, Bicimad and parking) to be used for bicycles) via the application’s migration assistant. When registering for MPass, the user links his profile to a means of payment with which the journeys made or the subscriptions taken out are billed. New users can sign up for the service directly from the application.
The data
This new phase of the mobility service begins with hopes of winning back the 9,605 subscribers they lost in 2022. Despite the fact that the main complaint from users was the poor condition of the bikes, the City Council’s Mobility and Environment Section, led by Borja Carabante, has only hired 40 maintenance workers to meet the needs of the service. These are added to the 118 that previously existed. The low staffing is offset by the cooperation of the user, who can now report the need for bike maintenance via a physical button located in each of the station’s moorings.
The cost of this extension of the service to all districts of Madrid – six more than now – amounts to 50 million euros, 30 of which will come from the European Union’s Next Generation Funds. Apart from the areas that did not yet have Bicimad, the service will also be reinforced in the districts where the old stations have already been replaced by the new ones. 225 of these new stations are dedicated: 10 in Arganzuela, 11 in Chamartín, nine in Tetuán, 40 in Fuencarral-El Pardo, 17 in Moncloa-Aravaca, 28 in Latina, 33 in Carabanchel, 15 in Usera, 21 in Puente Vallecas, 7 in Moratalaz, 21 in Ciudad Ruler. In addition to six in Arganzuela, three in Centro, one in Moncloa-Aravaca and three in Retiro.
The new bike model offers new improvements: it has a screen that determines the speed and battery level, which offers up to 70 kilometers of autonomy, also with luminous brakes and a special hole for a handbag as a basket .
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