Metrobus bike racks delayed while city reviews cycling plan

A decision by the City of St. John's to review its cycling plan has caused Metrobus to delay purchasing bike racks, which is one aspect of that plan.

Judy Powell, general manager of Metrobus, explained that because the bike racks are funded under the city cycling plan, Metrobus has delayed this purchase while the plan is under review.

"In the next few days I'll be having those discussions with the city as to where we'll be going with the bike rack plan, as part of the overall cycling plan with the city," said Powell.

The bike racks cost close to $2,000 each. That means it will cost between $80,000 to $100,000 to outfit all 53 vehicles in the Metrobus fleet.

Bike racks on buses are common features elsewhere in Canada.

"They are of course fairly popular in other cities in the country," said Powell.

She explained that they are fairly easy to operate, once the public is introduced to them.

"They are added to the front of the bus. And it's a rack that kind of folds down and can accommodate two bikes at a time," she said.

"The responsibility for loading and unloading the bike is the customer's themselves, so it's a bit of an education campaign that we're going to need to go through ourselves for our customers."

Powell said that before Metrobus moved to its new location on December 1 of last year, the organization could not have even considered having bike racks on its buses, because the storage facility and bus wash at the old location did not have the physical room to accommodate bike racks.