The city of Syracuse has relaunched a city-wide bike share program that will allow people to rent more than just bikes.
Electric scooters are joining the Syracuse Sync shared micro mobility program. The city has joined forces with a Chicago company called Veo to bring the bikes and scooters to Syracuse. The city’s initial fleet is heavy on the scooters, with 50 pedal-assist e-bikes and 250 electric scooters in service this fall.
"Initially our company starts out with a heavy focus on pedal-assisted bikes, and found out people prefer scooters, so a shift to scooters made more sense,” said Vik Ram, Veo’s general manager in Syracuse.
Renting a bike or scooter is done with an app, and riders are charged by the minute. The scooters right now will be available at 30 locations around the city. But Syracuse Mayor Ben Walsh hopes this is just the beginning.
“We’re starting slow, but we intend to grow this program,” Walsh said. “We are using the existing “corrals” if you will, in the existing locations where we initially rolled it out. But we want to expand that and we want to hear from community members to see where they want it to expand."
The fundamental idea of this kind of transportation is the same as it was before the last electric bike company pulled out of town, because of the pandemic, creating transportation options for city residents.
"We know that often times, people are walking to work or walking to go shopping,” said Walsh. “They might use the bus, but there’s these in-between spaces that are hard to access. And we feel like these bikes and e-scooters can help people make that final stretch to their destination."
