Car2Go offering bike racks in Portland

Car2Go offering bike racks in Portland

Would you be more likely to use car-sharing if you could bring your bike along? For Portlanders, that will soon be a real possibility, as 250 vehicles in its Car2Go fleet will get bike racks.

Portland was one of the first U.S. cities with significant car-sharing fleets; and it was one of the first North American cities, after Austin, where Car2Go car-sharing was offered.

Factor in Portland’s reputation as a hub for bike-friendliness, and the city makes sense as a testbed for the feature.

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Car2Go offers mostly gasoline Smart Fortwo models, although in Portland there are 30 Smart Electric Drive models in service, for a total of 530 for the Portland area. Of those, 250 will eventually get bike racks.

Vehicles with the rack will show up as such via the app or website, and the feature won’t cost anything additional at this point.

The decision follows a membership survey through which Car2Go found that of its 30,000 members, nearly 40 percent bike regularly throughout the week.

The racks, according to one source, will add about two feet to the rear of Fortwo models to which they’re installed; they’ll also interfere with the opening of the hatch (and with parking, perhaps, although the Fortwo is just 106 inches long).

They will use a security key, which will allow drivers to make stops along the way even after bringing a bike.

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A request to Car2Go for more information about deployment was unanswered; although Car2Go did release a video (below) on how to use its bike racks.

Car2Go now serves 15 cities in North America ans 27 cities worldwide, with more than 750,000 registered members.

We’re eager to hear your feedback, especially if you’re a regular user of car sharing. Would you like the option to mix cycling and driving?

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