Jim Takes a Bike Share

Friday, August 21 was the official kickoff day for the the City of Victoria's new E-Bike Share system.

Victoria has a municipal election coming up in October, and, unsurprisingly to anyone who has followed the last few municipal elections, social media and the Times Colonist letters page are burning with outrage.

Some recent letters are:

• Not enough parking even before the Lime invasion
• Why aren’t we using a Canadian company?
• Paying a high price for the rental e-bikes 
• What about the people who can’t use e-bikes?
• Comment: Victoria's taxpayers are subsidizing a U.S. e-bike business 

The social media is worse, as usual, and is filled with people drawing equivalences between first generation bike shares (like the abortive U-Bicycle here in Victoria) and modern bikes shares like our new Lime system, and the systems used in places like Montreal, Vancouver, Toronto, New York City, Paris, London, etc.

Also unsurprisingly, there's a lot of misinformation out there, and I will go through some of it later in this post.

In addition to misinformation, no matter the motivation, I suspect many people are confusing bike shares with traditional bike rentals. That's understandable—they both "rent" bikes—but the goals, purposes, usage, and pricing structures are completely different.

The rest of this post will be broken up as follows:

• What Problem Do Bikes Shares
• What Are Some Limitations of Bike Shares?
• How did we get here?
• The Council Meeting
• Why did the city go with Lime?
• Rolling our own would require a lot of work and upfront costs for a small city
• Cities have rules
• Base Pricing
• LimePrime
• LimePass
• Pricing Comparison
• Pricing compared to a traditional bike rental
• My first ride!
• Helmets
• The seat
• The kickstand
• Unlocking the bike
• The Ride
• Returning the bike
• A more "realistic" ride
• Will I use Victoria's bike
• Debunking
• Did the City of Victoria eliminate "hundreds" of car parking spots?
• Did the City of Victoria eliminate all the prime bicycle parking?
• Will using the bike-share cost $25 per hour?
• Not everybody can ride a bike
• The bikes will all end up thrown in the Gorge
• The City of Victoria should never have considered a U.S. based company
• Next Steps
• References

What Problem Do Bikes Shares Solve?

Cities are full of people. That's the point. Good and bad. All those people let us have shops, restaurants, museums, art venues, and performance spaces all in close proximity. The downside is that cities are crowded. As Yogi Berra famously said:

Nobody Goes There Anymore, It’s Too Crowded 

Space in cities is always in short supply.

Because space is tight, for most people in cities, most of the time, the best way to travel short distances is by foot. Why?

• A person standing takes up less than a square meter of space.
• We don't have to store our feet when we get where we're going.

[By the way, accessibility in cities is super important. Not everyone can walk, not everyone can walk far, parents have baby carriages, people have to move heavy items, etc. The list of reasons to improve accessibility is endless. At the same time, walking is the best way to get around a city for most people, most of the time.]

For short trips walking is efficient. You don't have to get anything. You just walk.

But walking is also slow, so for longer trips, we look for help. People travel in cities:

• By car, but then you have to find a parking space, and since each parking space takes up 12–18 square meters, there is NEVER enough parking for everyone to store a car near their destination.
• By bus, but then you have to wait for a bus to come, and the bus may not go where you want to go.
• By taxi or  rideshare, but you have to wait, and it's expensive.
• With your own bike or scooter, but you still have to find a parking space and lock up your vehicle. You can fit 6­–8 standard bikes (fewer cargo bikes) in the space of one car spot, and bike parking is easier to tuck into corners, but you still have to find one.
• With a traditional bike rental,  but they're expensive and you have to pick up and return the bike on a fixed schedule to a fixed location, and if you stop at a shop you still have to find a place to park and lock up the rental bike.

That's only some of the options. People are endlessly inventive, and there's a reason why you sometimes see people commuting on skateboards (hint: you can carry them into the office).

So, where do bike shares fit in?

Bike shares have aspects in common with both walking and transit. In someways, bike shares are like having feet with superpowers, but, like transit, you can only start or stop trips at specific locations. But, like feet, and unlike transit, bike shares aren't limited to a fixed route:

• 
  
  Bikes move faster and require less effort than walking.
• They have dedicated parking zones, so you know where you're going to put the bike when you're done.
• They can use the bike & roll network, so they're not stuck in heavy vehicular traffic.
• You can "mix and match" with other forms of transportation. You can drive downtown, leave your car in a parkade, and then take a bike share to your destination.
• You can ride your bike in from Saanich, leave it at the downtown Victoria bike valet, and use a bike share. 
• You can take a bus to somewhere reasonably close to your destination, then use a bike share for the last leg of the trip.
• You can take a bike share to start your trip, then take a bus home if it rains.
• Victoria's Lime bikes have to be picked up and dropped off in dedicated zones, but you can pick up and return your bike to different zones.

The synergy between different modes of transportation drives the location of bike-share parking zones. For example, bike-share parking zones are often located near bus stops.

In short, bike shares provide a space and time efficient option for short to medium length trips that works well in conjunction with walking, cycling, transit.

What Are Some Limitations of Bike Shares?

Every form of transportation has limitations, and bike shares definitely have theirs. Here are some:

• A bike-share parking zone may not have any bikes.
• At the end of a trip, the bike-share parking zone may be full.
• The system works best when rides are short, since that means that a bike is more likely to be available when someone wants it, so the pricing structure is set up to encourage short trips.
• As I discovered on a trip to Vancouver where we used the Mobi bike share, buses, and water taxis, the bikes were a bit "one size fits all." They were fine for this 6'2" senior to ride short distances, but for a longer ride I'd want one that fit me properly!

Better bike-share systems, like Lime, have features that help minimize many of these problems. For example:

• The app shows you how many bikes are in a zone.
• The app shows you how many open spots are in a zone. 
• The app lets you reserve a bike ahead of time.
• The companies "rebalance" bikes to help even out the distribution.

How did we get here?

The long and winding road
That leads to your door
Will never disappear
I've seen that road before
It always leads me here
Lead me to you door

The problems that bike shares address are common to many cities. For example, Montreal's Bixi system started in 2009, ran into trouble in 2013, filed for bankruptcy in 2014, was bought out by the City of Montreal, and is currently run by the non-profit Bixi Montréal.

The City of  Victoria allowed the company U-Bicycle to set up a pilot dockless bike-share system back in 2017. Things did not go well. Because the system did not use parking zones bikes could be left anywhere, which meant that thoughtless people blocked sidewalks and generally made a mess. The bikes were self-locking—in theory, you used an app to unlock a bike. Unfortunately, the locks could be quickly broken off, leaving a completely functional bike, and theft was rampant. There was limited information sharing with the city. The system collapsed after a year.

May 1, 2017 marked the opening of Victoria's first protected bike lane, on Pandora Avenue. Since then the core AAA bike network has been substantially built out, over 40km of AAA network has been built, and it's now easy and safe to bike or roll to much more of the city.

So, in July of 2025, Victoria's City Council voted unanimously to approve plans and seek a private operator for a new e-bike share system. The presentation and initial vote was on July 3.

The Council Meeting

Council discussed the following:

• Safety for new e-bike users, including helmet requirements and potential for injury
• Prevention of theft and destruction of bikes
• Comparison of proposed system to other regional initiatives
• Scope of the proposed Request for Proposal
• Effect of the program on local bike shops and rental services
• Access to bikes for low income individuals

The staff report makes for interesting reading. It discusses the different ownership models for bike share: publicly owned and operated, publicly owned and externally operated, privately owned and operated, and publicly administered but privately owned and operated.

The staff recommendation, which council accepted, was to go with a publicly administered but privately owned and operated model:

Publicly administered but privately owned and operated service (recommended)

This is currently the most popular approach in Canada as it allows for a high degree of regulation while limiting the public investment required. Disadvantages of this model include a lack of control over pricing for users and implications if the system is not profitable for the operator. This model allows experience and expertise to be obtained which could be used if a different financial model was considered in the future.

The report also discussed the three primary parking models for bike share: docked, dockless, and parking zones.

The staff recommendation was to go with parking zones:

Parking Zones (recommended)

This model has many of the same benefits of docked systems while replacing the permanent locking stations with a cheaper, lighter and more flexible approach. Typically, geofence technologies (a virtual boundary) are used in combination with a painted, signed boundary to mark the dedicated parking zone. Dependent on location/anticipated demand, these will be approximately the size of a single vehicle parking space. Parking zones could be upgraded to docked charging stations in the future if desired. Constructing and providing the parking zones for use by the selected operator allows for ownership of the parking zones for potential future versions of shared micromobility systems, more control over location and design, and allows the operator to focus on other elements of the system.

Finally, the report discussed the types of devices for shared microbility systems: classic bikes, e-scooters, and e-bikes.

The staff recommendation was, at least initially, to go with e-bikes only:

E-bikes (recommended)
Like personal electric bicycles, shared e-bikes are being used much more widely and for longer trips than classic bikes and are more accessible to a wider range of the population. Disadvantages include that they tend to be priced higher than classic bikes for the user due to being more expensive to purchase and maintain. E- bikes also require charging, which tends to be done through battery swapping, where removable batteries are charged off-site and replaced with fully charged batteries. In more established, publicly owned systems, batteries can be charged at electrified docking stations. This reduces labour costs of battery swapping but requires high capital costs for the infrastructure which cannot be easily relocated. 

Whether by coincidence or not, the staff recommendation closely matched the business model of Evolve, the bike share sytem that's owned by the BCAA and is being piloted in Saanich and Langford. Many people, including me, assumed that the City of Victoria's procurment would end up selecting Evolve, but that didn't happen.

As mentioned above, Council unanimously approved the staff recommendation.

Why did the city go with Lime? 

Given that Langford and Saanich are running 3-year pilot programs with Evolve, which is owned by the BCAA, why didn't Victoria single source the contract or set up a system like Bixi out of Montreal?

Rolling our own would require a lot of work and upfront costs for a small city

One of the best models for bike share is Montreal's Bixi system. Montreal has 1.8 million people. Victoria has about 100,000. Setting up a system, buying bikes, hiring and training people, etc. all require time and money. We have a decades old backlog of infrastructure that the city is actively working on, including the Crystal Pool replacements, and a rapidly rising police budget. Given all of that, the city chose to go with staff's Publicly administered but privately owned and operated service recommendation. The staff recomendation gave the city considerable, but not complete, policy control, minimized the city's costs, and removed all downstream financial risk.

With the chosen option, the city spent about $250,000 to set up bike-share parking zones that it continues to own. Furthermore, Lime will pay an operating fee to the city for, among other things, the use of the public right of way. The contract defines service criteria and has operational oversight, but the city has no financial obligations beyond providing access to the bike-share parking zones.

To put the city's costs in context, Victoria's 2026-2039 Financial Plan shows the average Major Street Reabilitation expenditure over the next five years at $6,940,000 every year. The number for Local Street Reahabilitation is $4,250,000 every year. We spend $550,000 annually on Street Lighting Replacement every year.

There are good arguments that bike share, like transit, should be at least partially publicly funded, and that's the model that Montreal has taken and that, perhaps, the CRD could take in the future. Going that route, though, would require much larger up-front expenses than the Publicly administered but privately owned and operated service approach, so it's not surprising that Victoria, like most cities with bike shares, make the choice it did.

Cities have rules

Municipalities have rules they are required to follow, and a lot of those rules are around procurement. If Victoria had decided to run a limited-scope pilot program they might have been able to offer the contract to a single source, such as Evolve. In this case, because of the size and scope of the project, the city chose to go through the standard procurement process.

In the standard procurement process, council authorizes the Request for Proposal (RFP), and then staff picks the winning bid using the criteria listed in the RFP. Council involvement after the RFP is issued would open up the city to lawsuits. Both Lime and Evolve, and perhaps others, submitted bids, and Lime's bid best met the city's criteria.

Once the process starts, the city has to follow it through, and the city council is no longer involved. That's how the process is designed.

This also leads into another issue. Why, in the middle of a trade war, is Victoria awarding a contract to Lime, a company with U.S. roots?

First, the City of Victoria does not have a strict "Buy Canadian" policy. In the August 10, 2025 discussion around the report that looked at the possibility, I heard staff say that they would be implementing a Canadian Preference Component to their evaluation criteria, but I don't know exactly what that meant or the conditions under which it applied. The statement is at 2:08 in the video. However, that may apply to procurement, and according to Councillor Hammond this fell under a different policy.

Also, Councillor Caradonna, in a reply to a Facebook post by Todd Littman of the Victoria Transport Policy Institute related a conversation he had with the city's CFO about Lime:

Hi all. I conferred with our CFO to get the facts on Lime, since many people have taken an interest in this contract. Some of the things I learned from transpo staff were slightly incorrect, and our finance team was able to set things straight.
Here is what I was told, and which I’m passing along.

1. Although Lime has US roots, the entity that submitted the tender is Lime Technology Inc (Lime Canada), which has been registered in Canada (and BC) since 2018. It has local staff and warehouses. Thus, it was considered to be a Canadian entity, not an American one, in the tender process. This is a key piece of information that I overlooked and need to correct. Thus, the supposed American-ness of the company was irrelevant to the process.
2. The City ran a competitive process open to any qualified company and Lime was selected as the best overall value and best met the City’s criteria.
3. This is not the type of contract trade agreements are designed to govern. Thus the CUSMA/WTO/New West Partnership/CFTA dimension is less relevant here than it otherwise would be due to the licensing agreement. To quote staff, “Trade agreements set rules for when the City buys goods or services and spends pubic money. The bike-share arrangement works the other way around: Lime pays the City for the right to use public space for its parking zones. In other words, this is a license for the use of a public asset that generates revenue for the City, *not* a purchase by the City.” If the licensing agreement were different, then the trade agreements would be more germane.

My apologies for getting certain aspects of the contract wrong. I will delete my previous post. Thanks for pushing me to check with staff and correct the record. 

And Councillor Hamond has an opinion piece in the Time Colonist in which he says:

As it turns out, this bike-share contract does not fall under our procurement policies, but falls under the Council Policy “Guiding principles for the use of public space” adopted in 2011.

Hammond says that he will be introducing a council member motion to "recommend lawful changes to the city’s ­purchasing, contracting and other ­business-related policies", although my understanding of RFP rules suggests that having staff report back to council after an RFP has been issued would either not be permissible or would open the city up to lawsuits (but I'm not an expert, so that's just a suspicion).

So, could the city have set up a "Contract Canadian" policy? Maybe. I suspect we'll find out.

Alternately, could the city have required operational compatibility with surrounding municipalities? That question was discussed at the council meeting. The answer was that a better framework would be for the municipalities to make a single bid together. Victoria reached out to several surrounding municipalities, including Saanich, but Sannich chose to go with a prototype 3-year single-source bid on their own. It's also important to note that Victoria authorized it's RFP before Saanich implemented their program.

How much does it cost?

The pricing is all visible on the app. There are three types of pricing:

• The base pricing, suitable for infrequent, short, trips.
• The LimePrime subscription, suitable for frequent, modest, trips.
• The LimePass bundles, which offer discounted, prepaid, pricing options.

In addition, the City included an access and equity criteria in their RFP, and the Lime Bikes answer is their Lime Access program that offers 80% discounts for people with low income, disabilities, refugees, people receiving the Senior's Supplemnt, subsidised bus passes, the L.I.F.E. program, etc. See their site for details.

Base Pricing

The base pricing can be found by clicking on a bike in the app. I suspect it's done this way because, even though Victoria has all e-bikes, the app is set up to handle multiple types of bikes and scooters.

The base price, at time of publication, is $1.15 to unlock a bike, and $0.34 per minute. You pay GST, but not PST, so the tax rate is 5%. You can reserve a bike for free up to 10 minutes in advance.

For what seem like realistic trips, you're almost always going to be better off buying a pass. For example, a very short 10 minute trip would cost $4.78 (including tax) with the base pricing, but a 30 minute pass is only $3.99! For any ride over 7 minutes you're better off with a pass, and 7 minutes isn't very long when you consider that you'll likely spend at least a minute getting ready and returning the bike.

LimePrime

A LimePrime subscription costs $5.99 a month that appears to include taxes (at least, I wasn't charged any).

• The subscription is $5.99 per month.
• Rides up to 20 minutes are $3.
• Rides up to 5 minutes are $1.50.
• Additional minutes are $0.25 / minute plus tax.
• There is no unlocking fee. 
• 30 minute reservations are free.

In my opinion, the flat rate 20 minute ride is useful: there are a LOT of rides in the Victoria area that are between 10 and 20 minutes! Also, the reduced per-minute rate of $0.25 feels less steep than the base, though would certainly add up for a long ride.

The real advantage of LimePrime, though, is that you don't have to think about it. You just pay your $5.99 and ride, and you won't pay through the nose. You will, however, almost always be able to do better with a pass. 

LimePass

The steepest discounts are through the LimePass option, but getting the absolute most out of them will require some careful time management. However, you can "top up" your pass by purchasing additional minutes.

Basically, for any ride over 7 minutes you're better off buying a pass than using the base pricing, and that 7 minutes includes the time it takes you to return the bike.

In my opinion, I can't ever see using the base pricing.

Pricing Comparison 

Here are some charts of the cost of the different pricing plans by the number of rides. I included two variants of the LimePass pricing: the first assumes "perfect" time management, while the second assumes that passes are always purchased with 20 minutes of slop.

Here's a chart showing all of the plans assuming that each ride is 15 minutes long:

Base, LimePrime, and LimePass options for 15 minute rides

 

The following charts examine 10, 20, and 30 minute rides. I left off the base pricing because it's too expensive and made the relative costs of the reasonable options harder to see.

 

LimePrime and Passes—10 minute rides

LimePrime and Passes—20 minute rides

LimePrime and Passes—30 minute rides

There are a lot of approximations here, notably the assumption that all rides are the same length, so take this with a grain of salt.

What I take away from this is that the LimePrime subscription offers reasonable price performance for those who just want to unlock a bike and go. Perhaps obviously, the closer your rides are to 20 minutes, the better the LimePrime subscription looks relative to buying a LimePass.

I think (I haven't tried this) that it's possible to combine LimePrime with a LimePass. For example, if most of your trips are short, but you need to make a longer trip, then buying a LimePass would make a lot of sense.

All that said, if you're watching pennies, and are willing to put in the effort to track your time, then purchasing LimePasses will often be the most cost-effective way to use the bike share.

Pricing compared to a traditional bike rental

On several occasions we've had friends from out of town visit and, since cycling is such a great way to get around Victoria, they rented bikes. The place we used offers multiple options including traditional and electric bikes. The least expensive traditional bike costs $12 / hour, $35 for 4 hours and $55 for the day. Their electric bikes cost $25 / hour, $70 for 4 hours, and $85 for the day.

A 300 minute (5 hour) LimePass at $35 is certainly price competitive, but, personally, I don't find this an apples to apples comparision.

If I was getting around town using a mix of walking, cycling, and transit using the bike share (there's a "group ride" feature that lets you reserve multiple bikes) would be a no-brainer.

However, when you go to a rental shop they pick a frame that fits you. They adjust it. They provide a lock. The e-bikes are fully charged and they give you a charger. And the bikes they rent are the same sort that most people would buy for themselves. Furthermore, their bikes aren't limited to the City of Victoria. You could ride one to Metchosin!

The downside is the cost and the fact that you have to pick up and return the bike to a brick & mortar store. That would be a pain for an hour, but's nothing for a day or a week's use of  bike. 

So, if I wanted to rent a bike that I would use the way I use my own bike I would absolutely go to a local bike rental. Every time.

My first ride!

On Friday morning my wife and I dragged ourselves out of bed and used the brand new bike share to visit The Ruby on Johnson.

The cost was $3.00 because I had purchased LimePrime.

Here are some observations:

Helmets

• Helmets lock into the basket.
• The helmets are unlined, presumably to keep costs down and to make them easy to clean and dry.
• Comfort on my mostly bald head was OK at best. 
• The helmets are adjustable, but my wife's didn't adjust small enough.
• On my second trip I wore a brimmed hat under the Lime helmet, and I think that's what I'll do moving forward.

The seat

• We both found the seat comfortable.
• They are extremely easy to adjust.
• They adjust for both short and relatively tall riders.

To put that last point in perspective, I'm 6'2" tall, and raised the seat post all the way up. In a perfect world I would have gone a little higher, but riding the bike was fine, especially since it's electric.

In comparison, we were in Vancouver a little while ago and got around using Mobi (their bike share), transit, water taxis, and our feet. It was a blast, but the seat didn't adjust anywhere near high enough. I felt like I was riding a kids bike with my knees bent all the time. It made it hard to get any power. The Lime bikes here in Victoria are much better.

The kickstand

The kickstand is really good. It has two legs, so the bike stands completely upright.

Unlocking the bike

I found it easy:

• I used the app to scan a qr-code on the bike.
• It asked me if I wanted to use their helmet. I said yes and it unlocked it.
• It unnecessarily asked me if I'd put the hemet on. I said yes.
• I rode off. 

The Ride

The ride was surprisingly pleasant.

• There are no gears.
• The motor was quiet and felt powerful at the low speeds this bike is designed for.
• When starting up it took a moment before the motor kicked in. I found that noticable, but easy to adjust to.

I think that not having gears may help keep speed down as you'd have to pedal like a maniac to make one of these things go really fast, and that's a good thing for a bike share.

I have an Tern GSD electric cargo bike. The Tern has a Bosch Cargo Line hub drive motor that senses how hard one is pushing and smoothly blends in power. The system works very well, and I really don't feel the motor cutting in—it's like I was a young man who worked out! The Lime bike was not like that.

The Lime bike felt to me like a great tool for riding between stops. It was in no way like my expensive Bosch hub-drive system, nor did I expect it to be. It was, however, perfectly fine for what it is.

Returning the bike

Returning the bike was also easy, though I did have one (easily resolved) glitch. Here's how it works:

• You ride to a bike share parking zone. They're on the map in the Lime app and are easy to recognize because of the signs and distinctive lime green racks.
• You line your bike up with a rack and put down the kickstand.
• You open the app, which (at least as of my second outing) gives an indication that you're at a parking zone.
• You go to the app and indicate that the ride is over.
• The app asks you to take a picture of the docked bike next to the stand.
• You go on your way.

The glitch was that the first time I tried to park I got a message saying:

Sorry, but you can't park here 

By city regulations, in this area of the city you need to park in a Preferred Parking Spot. Preferred Parking Spots are marked on the map as blue parking icons.

Of course, I was already in a "preferred parking spot" (AKA a bike share parking zone). I tried again and it was happy. I talked to someone else online who had the same problem, reported their trip as "could not end", and got a refund. I hope and assume these are kinks that will get worked out.

What's really strange is that on my second outing, a few days later, the app told me that I was in a parking zone. I have no recollection of seeing that on my first outing, so perhaps they've tweaked something already. 

A more "realistic" ride

I also thought I'd try out a more "realistic" ride. I wanted to buy some frozen shrimp, so I grabbed a backpack, hopped on my cargo bike, and rode to Victoria's free bike valet, where I dropped off my bike and grabbed a nearby bike share. Many people use the bike valet because they don't want to park their bike on the street, so I think this is a realistic scenario.

I bought a $3.99 30 minute pass, and took three Lime rides:

1. From the bike valet to Thrifty's in James Bay to buy shrimp.
2. From Thrifty's to Farm + Field on Blanshard to buy some chicken thighs.
3. From Farm & Field back to the bike valet. 

From the Bike Valet to Thrifty's in James Bay

From Thrifty's to Farm + Field on Blanshard

From Farm + Field back to the Bike Valet 

When I was done I still had five minutes left on the pass. I checked my time left before my last ride. It's easy, and the app offers you the opportunity to add more minutes.

Time Left on a Lime Pass

There were things that I really liked about getting around town this way:

• I liked the option of not having to go back to where I left the bike. For example, on a road like Blanshard with one-way bike lanes on each side, it can be convenient to drop the bike off at one zone, then get the next ride at another.
• I liked the ability to mix and match walking, cycling, and transit. Even though I didn't use that on this trip, it was there. For example, if it had started raining part way through, I could have switched to transit.
• I enjoyed not having to use the really, really, really bad bike rack at the James Bay Thrifty's. It's completely unusable with a cargo bike, or any bike with a front rack.

Will I use Victoria's bike share?

Yes, I will.

I mostly use my bike for shopping, and I don't see that changing. I like my bike a lot, it has big panniers, it's comfortable, and most of my trips start and end at my home. Also, I have two locks, insurance, and feel comfortable leaving the bike in populated areas anywhere in the city.

But there are times when the bike-share will make a lot of sense:

• When part of the trip involves public transit.
• When I want to walk one way, or stick a long walk in the middle.
• When I'm picking up or dropping off my bike for service.

In other words, when my trips line up with what bike shares are good for, I'll absolutely use it. It's always good to have another arrow in one's quiver! 

Debunking

Did the City of Victoria eliminate "hundreds" of car parking spots?

No. As best I can tell, the bike-share system is taking 64 on-street parking spaces. The rest of the spaces are located off the road, and a few were converted from existing bike parking. The City of Victoria provides and maintains about 70,000 on-street parking spaces (not to mention the 3,700+ spots in downtown parkades,  surface parking lots, and private parking).

In other words, the bike share system "took" less that one tenth of one percent of the on-street parking spots in the city.

In addition, those spots are owned by the city—a city in which 1 in 4 households don't own a car.

Did the City of Victoria eliminate all the prime bicycle parking?

No. The city did convert a few existing bike parking areas to bike share parking zones, but the vast majority of zones were created from street parking or were located on avaiable, off-road, space.

Will using the bike-share cost $25 per hour?

This claim is an example of cherry-picking facts.

As shown in the How much does it cost? section, above, an hour rental using the base pricing scheme is just under $23 including tax. However, a 60 minute pass is $7.99, and 60 minute rental for LimePrime subscribers is $13, and three 20 minute LimePrime rentals are $9.00.

Beyond that, the whole point of bike shares is for people to pick up a bike, ride it to a station near their destination, and return the bike. Victoria is about 7 km across, so most trips within the city are going to be short. In fact, for the seven rides I've taken so far, the longest was just under 12 minutes (2.4 km from the downtown bike valet to Thrifty's in James Bay), and the average was under nine minutes.

In fact, enabling these short hops is the reason that the city set up bike-share parking zones every block or two.

So the $25 per hour claim is only true for people who choose the most expensive way to pay and use the bike share in a way that people don't typically use bike share systems.

Not everybody can ride a bike

Not everybody can drive a car. We don't prohibit cars. 

Not everybody can play the bagpipes. We don't prohibit bagpipes.

Requiring that a tool needs to solve 100% of a problem for everybody is called the perfectionist, or Nirvana, logical fallacy. It's not a good-faith argument.

The bikes will all end up thrown in the Gorge

A common refrain on social media is that the Lime bikes will all be stolen by homeless people and taken to chop shops or thrown in the Gorge. Certainly this happened a lot with the first generation "U-Bicycle" bikes, and that "clowncil shouild have known better!"

In fact, Councillors Hammond and Caradonna both asked about bike theft at the Committee of the Whole meeting where authorizing the bike share RFP was discussed. You can see Councillor Hammond's question and the answer at 20:10 in the video, and Councillor Caradonna's questions at 33:40.

The basic answer is that newer bike-share bicycles use customized designs with non-standard parts that cannot be used on regular bikes. The e-bikes are heavy and not as easy to carry as the older, non-electric, bikes. They have GPS trackers and lock internally (with, presumably, better locks than the old U-Bicycles used).

I thought one comment from staff (at 41:47 in the video) summed it up pretty well:

When talking to operators…. many of these…. now that we're so behind the game in a sense in bike-share, many of these operators have been operating for many, many years in many large cities with higher bike theft problems than even Victoria. That being said they do say, you know, there's always issues with parking and theft at the very beginning. Like any new program, there's going to be, you know, a couple of kinks in the system, and they figure out, pretty quickly, how to deal with them.

Bike share is not something that Victoria is inventing. Bike share is common around the world and the people investing billions of dollars in the industry are not naive. 

The City of Victoria should never have considered a U.S. based company

This one is tougher. Personally, I make every effort to buy locally and, if that's not possible, to buy Canadian. I have worn Levis jeans for decades, but my old ones wore out and I've replaced them with Canadian made jeans from "Big Bill". When I can, I buy my electronics from Memory Express or London Drugs. For years I had an Amazon Prime membership, but now I don't.

But when I can't find what I want locally, or if the cost is way out of line, I will go to Best Buy, or even Amazon.

One of the reasons I use an e-bike for transportation is that I believe strongly in reducing carbon emissions—but I still fly to visit my family.

The city had substantive reasons for not building their own, Bixi like, system. For one thing, I suspect many of the people angry about the bike share and furious that the city spent $250,000 to set up the bike share parking zones, would been livid if the city had spent millions of dollars rolling out their own system.

The city's RFP specified a bike-share system that was very close to the model that Evolve uses. The fact that Lime's bid was better, and apparently significantly so, suggests that this wasn't a situation where the city could have "just picked" a Canadian supplier. That doesn't surprise me: Lime is a huge company that operates around the world. They know what they're doing, and they can afford the level of capital investment needed to stand up a program quickly and effectively.

It's quick and easy to say that because Lime Canada is owned by Lime, that Canada and Victoria receive no benefits from this arrangement, but that isn't true. There's a big difference between contracting with the Canadian division of a multi-national corporation, and buying a product or service directly from an American company. As the City's FAQ notes, Lime Canada is hiring local staff, including a full-time Victoria based operations manager. They've also leased a local warehouse, which is staffed by locals, for battery charging and bike repairs. It's not the same as having a locally owned and operated company, but it's far from nothing.

Finally, having suffered through many election seasons in my life, I'm quite sure that many (not all, but many) of the people expressing outrage about Lime winning the contract are more than happy to shop at Costco, Walmart, Best Buy, Home Depot, and then grab a bite at Tim Hortons, the Old Spaghetti Factory, or many other chain restaurants, and then rant about the city on a US social media platform.

I wonder how many people have given up using Uber instead of a taxi. I wonder how many people have stopped ordering out using Uber Eats or DoorDash.

Heck, even Victoria Distillers, which makes the famous blue Empress Gin in Sidney, has been owned by an American company since 2022.

We live in a complicated world. 

Next Steps

So, where can we go from here?

I had assumed that the City of Victoria would have selected Evolve, that there would be a natural evolution to a CRD-wide bike-share program over time, and that, when the value was proven, that the CRD's new Regional Transportation Service would eventually take over administration and decide whether or not to pursue a Bixi-like system in the future.

It's unfortunate that Sannich and Victoria have ended up with different system. Saanich's 3-year prototype contract will expire in 2028, at which time they will probably need to put out a public bid for a replacement service. Victoria's 5-year standard contract with Lime will expire in 2031.

In the mean time, I hope that the CRD RTS will get going and take bike share on as one of its projects.  The RTS's key objectives are to:  increase walking, cycling and transit use; reduce carbon pollution; and tackle congestion. Bike share seems right up their alley, and is something that can be done without negotiating with the province (i.e., BC Transit).

Hopefully the next five years will prove bike share to be a useful addition to the region's transportation options.

Here are some things I'd like to see:

• Integration with transit would be really interesting. For example, it would be amazing if bike share and buses were treated identically, so taking a bike share to (or from) a bus counted as a transfer or towards a day pass. Of course, that would require integration with the provincially chartered BC Transit, but perhaps the CRD's Regional Transportation Service could do something if it gets more control over the region's buses.
• A publicly run system could use an easier pricing model. Lime's base pricing doesn't make sense to me, and I'd like to see a model that helped reduce car traffic by encouraging people to do their business around the city with a mix of walking, cycling, and transit. That would be a huge benefit to the city and, to my mind, well worth subsidizing.

If those are exciting to you, then I think the best way forward is to support the current effort. It will be a lot easier to justify a CRD run system in the future if the current system is successful.

References

The City of Victoria's E-Bikes and bike Share page

E-Bikes and bike Share | City of Victoria. (n.d.). City of Victoria. https://www.victoria.ca/getting-around/walking-riding-rolling/e-bikes-and-e-bike-share

Not enough parking even before the Lime invasion

Colonist, T. (2026, August 20). Letters Aug. 20: Cook Street bike lanes appreciated; lift U.S. booze ban. Times Colonist. https://www.timescolonist.com/opinion/letters-aug-20-cook-street-bike-lanes-appreciated-lift-us-booze-ban-12685795

Why aren’t we using a Canadian company?

Colonist, T. (2026a, August 19). Letters Aug. 19: B.C.’s land question is unresolved; why Lime bikes? Times Colonist. https://www.timescolonist.com/opinion/letters-aug-19-bcs-land-question-is-unresolved-why-lime-bikes-12679167

Paying a high price for the rental e-bikes 

Colonist, T. (2026b, August 19). Letters Aug. 19: B.C.’s land question is unresolved; why Lime bikes? Times Colonist. https://www.timescolonist.com/opinion/letters-aug-19-bcs-land-question-is-unresolved-why-lime-bikes-12679167

What about the people who can’t use e-bikes?

Colonist, T. (2026c, August 19). Letters Aug. 19: B.C.’s land question is unresolved; why Lime bikes? Times Colonist. https://www.timescolonist.com/opinion/letters-aug-19-bcs-land-question-is-unresolved-why-lime-bikes-12679167

Comment: Victoria's taxpayers are subsidizing a U.S. e-bike business

Van Schagen, N. (2026, August 20). Comment: Victoria’s taxpayers are subsidizing a U.S. e-bike business. Times Colonist. https://www.timescolonist.com/opinion/comment-victorias-taxpayers-are-subsidizing-a-us-e-bike-business-12685798

Nobody Goes There Anymore, It’s Too Crowded

Quoteresearch. (2014, August 29). Quote Origin: Nobody goes there anymore, it’s too crowded – quote Investigator®. https://quoteinvestigator.com/2014/08/29/too-crowded/

Downtown Victoria Bike valet

Downtown Victoria Bike valet. (n.d.). Capital Bike Hub. https://capitalbike.ca/bikevalet/ 

Montreal's Bixi system

Wikipedia contributors. (2026, June 18). Bixi (bicycle share system) - Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bixi_%28bicycle_share_system%29

Bringing Bike Share to Victoria - Committee of the Whole - July 03, 2025

Bringing Bike Share to Victoria - Committee of the Whole - July 03, 2025. (n.d.). https://pub-victoria.escribemeetings.com/Meeting.aspx?Id=5864a788-bc5c-4a97-a235-9430b0b23196&lang=English&Agenda=Merged&Item=12&Tab=attachments

Victoria's 2026-2039 Financial Plan

City of Victoria. (n.d.). 2026-2030 Financial Plan. In https://www.victoria.ca/media/file/2026-2030-financial-plan.

No changes in City of Victoria purchasing expected in light of trade war

Duffy, A. A. (2025, April 11). No changes in City of Victoria purchasing expected in light of trade war. Times Colonist. https://www.timescolonist.com/local-news/no-changes-in-city-of-victoria-purchasing-expected-in-light-of-trade-war-10509094 

Report back on Council Member Motion on Response to U.S. Trade War - Committee of the Whole - April 10, 2025

Report back on Council Member Motion on Response to U.S. Trade War - Committee of the Whole - April 10, 2025. (n.d.). https://pub-victoria.escribemeetings.com/Meeting.aspx?Id=54d90374-0380-49a3-b58e-fabc239b7ac0&lang=English&Agenda=Merged&Item=20&Tab=attachments

Facebook Post by Todd Litman of the Victoria Transport Public Institute

Todd Litman - Today’s Times Colonist includes this opinion piece. . . | Facebook. (n.d.). https://www.facebook.com/todd.litman/posts/pfbid02ARyvPBpwSyupDvM7NHRKpEiDrkDYWSgRgrWQobgub3oNaz6NtCzA265M5yenoNBjl?rdid=5wcRJQAzf0PJgFF5#

Victoria Transport Public Institute

Victoria Transport Public Institute. (n.d.). Victoria Transport Institute - main page. https://vtpi.org/

Comment: Victoria’s Lime bike deal did not go through city council

Hammond, S. (2026, August 29). Comment: Victoria’s Lime bike deal did not go through city council. Times Colonist. https://www.timescolonist.com/opinion/comment-victorias-lime-bike-deal-did-not-go-through-city-council-12720933 

Lime Access

Lime Access. (2026, August 17). Lime Micromobility. https://www.li.me/en-ca/why/community/lime-access

The Ruby on Johnson

The Ruby Victoria. (2025, November 14). Breakfast & brunch in Victoria, BC | The Ruby on Johnson. https://therubyvictoria.com/johnson/

Thrifty Foods James Bay

Thrifty Foods James Bay | Shop Fresh groceries. (n.d.). https://www.thriftyfoods.com/stores/9454-thrifty-foods-james-bay 

Farm + Field Butchers

Farm + field butchers. (2023, September 11). Farm + Field Butchers. https://www.farmandfieldbutchers.com/

Nirvana Fallacy

Wikipedia contributors. (2026b, July 1). Nirvana fallacy. Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nirvana_fallacy

Big Bill Made in Canada Jeans

Big Bill. (n.d.). Jeans. https://www.bigbill.com/collections/apparel-pants-jeans?sort_by=manual&filter.p.m.custom.country_of_origin=Canada

Memory Express

Memory Express, Inc. (n.d.). About Memory Express - Memory Express Inc. Memory Express. https://www.memoryexpress.com/Information/About.cm.aspx

London Drugs

London Drugs | 100% Canadian owned retail store. (n.d.). London Drugs. https://www.londondrugs.com/

CRD Regional Transportation Service

Regional Transportation Service. (n.d.). Capital Regional District. https://www.crd.ca/projects/current-projects-initiatives/regional-transportation-planning