Indego to Add 24 New Bike Stations in 2016

Photo | Indego Facebook

The wildly-successful Indego bike-sharing program will grow by a third next year, with 24 new bike stations, most of them to be clustered around city parks and waterfronts, the city said today.

What’s paying for the expansion? A $1.5 million grant from the William Penn Foundation.

“Indego is a valuable new amenity in Philadelphia, and its immediate popularity among residents and visitors speaks to the demand for active transportation options in the city,” Andrew Johnson, program director for Watershed Protection at the William Penn Foundation, said in a press release.

Indego notched 100,000 rides in its first two months, and more than 250,000 overall. Those are some healthy numbers for a brand new program. There’s serious demand for the service, and it makes a ton of sense to beef up availability in recreation hotspots.

Indego’s success is very good news for long-shot Independent at-large City Council candidate Andrew Stober, who was the lead architect of the program when he worked in the Mayor’s Office of Transportation. Few candidates in any election can credibly say they launched a popular civic program. Stober can.

More importantly, Indego can’t help but to build broader support for bicycling infrastructure in the city — yes, that means bike lanes. The less biking is seen as a niche activity, the more likely it is that City Council members and the next mayor will support investments in bike infrastructure.