Transport for London’s (TfL) existing cycle hire scheme has been joined by 500 electric bikes today. The new e-bikes have been distributed across key central London locations and can be docked at any of the scheme’s 800 docking stations.
As they use the existing docking stations, they will be recharged by the cycle hire staff swapping out the batteries.
New Santander ebike – image TfL
Initially, e-bikes will be available to registered users only, for a fare of £3.30 per 30-minute ride.
However, if you have a monthly or annual subscription to the bike hire service, in addition to unlimited normal bike hires for up to an hour for free, the e-bikes are also offered for just £1 for an hour’s hire.
- Monthly subscription £20
- Annual subscription: £120
The e-bike locations are now showing up on the TfL website map of docking stations, with a small electric symbol next to the icons to indicate which ones have an e-bike available to rent, and extra information about roughly how much charge is left in each bike.
TfL bike hire map
The cycle hire scheme has seen record levels of hires this year, with 9.5 million hires so far. This is 1.2 million higher than the same point last year, with every month from August 2021 to August 2022 recording the highest number of hires for the corresponding month.
Last year it was announced that Santander will continue to sponsor London’s cycle hire scheme until May 2025.
Thought 3.30 was a touch pricy then I figured out how much it’s competitors charge for an equivalent journey and it turned out to be much cheaper.
Still wondering how chavs manage to get Santander bikes out of the docks for free, recently watched a few try for a couple minutes without interacting with the console before snagging 3 bikes. Some sort of street magic.
The “chavs” as you put it probably booked a bike using their smartphone — as many people do.