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Official Transport for London report shows bike-hire scheme is used mainly by the affluent
BORIS JOHNSON'S £140M bike-hire scheme is used mostly by rich, middle-aged white men, an official survey has revealed.
In Transport for London's annual Travel in London report, figures show that six out of ten of those using the blue bikes enjoy an annual income of over £50,000, nine out of ten are white and seven out of ten come from the 25-44 age group.
Only 5% of hire-bike users earn less than £20,000, even though 40% of Londoners are in that income bracket.
While Johnson subsidises well-heeled cyclists, the London Mayor has decided to hike bus fares and cut bus routes across the capital. Buses are used predominantly by those on lower incomes and disproportionately by old people, children and minority groups.
Next year, the price of a single bus journey will go up from £1.20 to £1.30. Together with similar rises for Tube passengers, the new fares are set to bring in £125M, not far off the £140M the hire scheme will cost.
Even within the cycling budget, Johnson's spending favours the better off over the less affluent. While he plans to lavish funds on the hire scheme, the Mayor has under spent by tens of millions on other local cycling schemes, especially in the suburbs.
Oh, do recall that correlation does not equal (or even imply) causality.
Surely this is more down to *where* the cycle hire bike racks are located, right? If these existed in, say, Stockwell (currently stops in the southern part of Kennington) people would use them? A single-day member ship is, after all, cheaper than a bus fare. It makes sense to pilot in the centre and expand out-- the big use case now is people commuting in to the centre and then cycling rather than swapping to Tube or bus-- who tend to be higher income white males.
Get real - cycling is a brilliant way to improve public health, and studies have shown that investment in cycling pays back THREE times what it costs.
Improving facilities also helps people see the benefits of cycling - fast, fun, cheap, healthy
And don't forget that £140 million is peanuts compared with the Transport for London budget that runs to £8 BILLION