City residents will soon be able to hire bicycles at a throwaway price, once the Chennai Corporation launches its long-pending cycle sharing system.
The Chennai Corporation has re-scheduled the tender to be closed on Friday for fixing a contractor for the cycle sharing system. The contract for the cycle sharing system would work on a Design, Built, Finance and Operate (DBFO) basis.
A senior official of the Chennai Corporation said the cycle sharing system to be implemented on a private-public partnership (PPP) model would be launched in the coming months.
Explaining the delay in starting the project, he said when the first tender was floated there were very few takers.
The tender process was rescheduled and officials are hoping to find a contractor this time. The only specification for awarding the tender to any bidder would be lowest charge per hour, he added.
The official said the cycle sharing project comes in the backdrop of a feasibility study conducted by the Institute for Transportation and Development Policy (ITDP) in 2014.
The study aims to provide last mile connectivity to boost the public transport including buses, metro, and suburban train services. The official said in Phase I to be launched in Teynampet and Kodambakkam zones around 5,000 cycles are planned to be put on roads in more than 400 locations for which docking stations have been identified.
Any resident can pick up a cycle and leave it at any of the other locations spread across the city, on payment of a minimal charge. An app will also be created for this project for cyclists to use, sources added.
