Divvy bikes hit the streets of Chicago 10 years ago. The decade has been filled with changes and challenges.

Ten years ago, the first big blue Divvy bikes hit Chicago streets, on a mission to provide quick, inexpensive transportation and add one more car-free way of getting around the sprawling city. The shared bikes made their delayed, slightly bumpy debut during the 2013 Blackhawks Stanley Cup victory parade , at first serving only the streets of downtown and River North. Transportation officials at the time thought they would be especially geared toward Metra and CTA commuters who needed a quick way to travel between train stations and offices.

Advertisement In the decade since, Divvy has in many ways become part of the fabric of Chicago. The bikes are one option for commuters to reach offices, but they have also been used by tourists, residents heading out for errands or social outings and recreational riders who flocked to the bikes during the COVID-19 pandemic. Cecilia Reta and her boyfriend, Ezequiel Borra, both visiting from Argentina, rent bicycles at the Divvy bike-share station at Illinois Street and McClurg Court on June 28, 2013, the first day of Chicago’s bike-sharing program.

(Terrence Antonio James/Chicago Tribune) But the bike system also faced challenges. Divvy only reached all of the city’s 50 wards this year, and advocates say despite progress, not enough has been done to serve majority Black and brown areas that need more public transportation options. Advertisement The introduction of e-bikes in 2020 meant easier pedaling for riders, but also sent prices skyrocketing for many trips, making Divvy unaffordable for some.

The prevalence of e-bikes was one of the factors contributing to a shortage of bikes on the streets last summer . And complaints about the availability and condition of docks, bikes and bike lanes persist. [ A new lane in Chicago politics? Movement for more bike infrastructure grows ] “There’s a lot of benefits that are largely accruing in predominantly white neighborhoods,” said Olatunji Oboi Reed, president and CEO of the racial equity-focused mobility nonprofit Equiticity.

“And we want those benefits to come to our neighborhoods as well. ” In one key change in response to the concerns, the Chicago Department of Transportation said it is reinvesting in traditional pedal bikes, which are cheaper to rent than e-bikes. E-bikes will remain in use, but no part of the city will be limited to only e-bikes, CDOT said.

CDOT described the strategy to start in dense areas and work out to the neighborhoods as intentional, but acknowledged the pace of expansion was slower than officials would have liked. The agency has built an average of about 30 new miles of bike lanes a year since 2020, officials said, reaching about 423 miles of bike lanes, shared lanes and trails in March, compared with more than 4,000 miles of city streets. “I think what we’ve shown is that people want bike share and it’s a valuable service for a city to be offering as a way to get around both during the pandemic and afterward,” said Sean Wiedel, Chicago Department of Transportation deputy commissioner of citywide services.

Divvy launched June 28, 2013, with some 700 bikes and 68 docking stations concentrated in dense, central parts of the city. Five years later, Lyft purchased the operator of the bike-share system and then poured $50 million into Divvy in exchange for much of the rider revenue, a commitment to expand the system and payments to the city. Advertisement Ridership in the past 10 years has skyrocketed.

In the first full month of Divvy’s existence, cyclists rented Divvy bikes about 76,500 times, according to Lyft data. In May 2023, riders took more than 680,300 trips on Divvy bikes. Hover over the chart to reveal monthly totals.

And much of that growth came during the pandemic. From 2015 to 2020, the number of annual trips Divvy bikes took hovered between 3 and 4 million. But in 2021 Divvy trips jumped to 5.

6 million, and in 2022 the bikes took 6. 4 million trips. Pandemic spurts in ridership were a key part of Divvy’s growth, as people looked for socially distant ways to get around and as the Divvy service area expanded, Wiedel said.

Hover over the chart to see ridership totals each year. It also brought changes in who was riding the bikes, and where. Historically, tourists made up about one-third of trips, and, because they are likely to pay per ride at a more expensive rate than a membership, they subsidized two-thirds of the costs of the system, Wiedel said.

Advertisement During the pandemic, ridership shifted to city neighborhoods. Spots popular with tourists such as downtown and the lakefront are still busy riding locations, but less touristy areas have picked up in popularity, Wiedel said. In May, among the 10 most popular Divvy stations were ones at Navy Pier, downtown and on the Near North Side, along the lakefront and in Hyde Park.

Divvy stations aren’t a perfect representation of where rides take place, because some bikes can be locked to an object such as a lightpole instead of starting or ending in a station. A Divvy bicycle rider waits for a light to change beside a Divvy station at Clinton and Washington in Chicago on June 22, 2023. (Chris Sweda/Chicago Tribune) Riders at those locations included people such as Anton Martin, 51, who uses Divvy to deliver for DoorDash.

His car hasn’t been running, he said while checking out a classic pedal bike downtown on a recent morning. Kennady Jones, 25, rides regularly from his Gold Coast home to his Loop office, or north to play golf, or when he’s going somewhere he knows he’ll be drinking. It’s cheaper and better for the environment than taking a car, he said, and it also fills in the gaps between public transit and his destination.

“I get off the train here, I’ve got another 20-minute walk from here,” Jones said. “Can I make that a five-minute Divvy ride?” Daniel Griffis, 34, rides Divvy so often his friends call him Divvy Dan. He doesn’t have a car, and finds public transit isn’t always reliable.

He had a personal bike stolen, and said it’s less stressful to use Divvy than worry about his bike getting taken again. Advertisement Riding an electric bike from his Bucktown home to his downtown office can take the same amount of time, or sometimes less, than public transit. And, with a membership, the price is similar to paying for transit three or four times a week, he said.

Without a membership, though, he wouldn’t ride e-bikes, he said. They’d be too expensive. “I’m trying to go over closer to the lake, you can just jump on Divvy and go over,” he said.

“That could be like, $10, $11, $12 dollars. You get a membership, it’s like, $3. And it’s faster and easier than going all the way in on the Blue Line and trying to take a bus.

” An annual membership costs $130. 90, and includes free rides up to 45 minutes for regular bikes and discounts on e-bikes. Cyclists who purchase a single ride pay $1 to unlock the bike, then $0.

17 per minute for a regular bike and $0. 42 per minute for an e-bike. The expense of e-bikes has been a sticking point in some communities.

Divvy didn’t come to Belmont Cragin until 2021, and when it did, e-bikes were prevalent, said Jeremy Cuebas, transportation organizer at the Northwest Center. But the following year, e-bike prices went up and a zone where fees were waived was eliminated. Advertisement That left students such as Emmanuel Garcia, 15, scrambling.

Garcia, who works with the Northwest Center to advocate for transit in the community, said the former fee waiver zone allowed him to take an e-bike to his school at the time for free. But one day the free zone disappeared with no warning. Garcia now gets to his high school, Muchin College Prep in the Loop, by bus and train.

A student with no regular source of income, he can’t afford a Divvy membership. “I’ve had to wake up earlier to get to the bus stop and catch the bus, and time it perfectly to catch the train too,” he said. Cuebas said bikes are an important transportation option in Belmont Cragin, where bus service isn’t always reliable, and gas prices mean catching a ride from a parent or friend isn’t always feasible.

Divvy is an especially important option for youth, he said. Cuebas praised Divvy’s community engagement, but said the expense and lack of consistency in pricing are barriers. CDOT said earlier this year it would be doubling down on traditional stations that serve both e-bikes and regular bikes, and converting e-bike-only stations to accommodate both types of bikes, including in Belmont Cragin.

A handful of new e-bike only stations might go in before the city switches entirely to stations that accommodate both, Wiedel said. Advertisement Divvy bike riders on the Lakefront Trail on May 2, 2023. (Eileen T.

Meslar / Chicago Tribune) About 3,000 new classic blue bikes will be added into the Divvy system this year and next, after many were lost during the pandemic and unrest in 2020, Wiedel said. And the city and Lyft have new requirements to make sure a set amount of pedal and e-bikes are distributed across city neighborhoods. “We wanted people to have choices,” Wiedel said.

“If people can’t afford any bike, or prefer to ride a classic pedal bike, we want them to have that option. ” Cuebas also questioned why it took so long for Divvy to reach Belmont Cragin. “They’ve been around for 10 years, so why didn’t they come earlier?” he said.

That was a sticking point for Reed, who is based in North Lawndale. For most of its existence, Divvy largely did not extend south of 87th Street. The Far South Side didn’t get stations until summer 2020 .

Reed praised Divvy and the progress the program has made in expanding and establishing a program for low-income riders, Divvy for Everyone. But it took too long for Divvy to reach majority-Black and brown neighborhoods, and more can be done to encourage residents to feel comfortable using bikes, he said. Advertisement For example, the city could judge the success of the program based on ridership, not simply the placement of stations, he said.

Divvy has been good about partnering with community organizations to help familiarize people with biking, but could do more. And bikes are not available as densely in North Lawndale as they are in other places, which can be a problem in neighborhoods that have seen disinvestment and where jobs and destinations are spread farther apart, he said. Heat map of Divvy stations across the city interactive_content “No pun intended here, transportation is one of the vehicles to improve life outcomes for people in our neighborhoods,” he said.

“It’s literally the way people get to destinations that could have a positive impact on their life, like a better school, a better job, recreation, fitness, health care. ” When people feel comfortable riding they can create vibrant streets full of residents. That can help attract more retail, which brings more jobs.

And that has the potential to reduce violence, which is the primary barrier to people moving about their neighborhoods, Reed said. Wiedel said Divvy began in the center of the city and worked outward in an attempt to avoid islands of the bike system isolated from the rest of the network. But ultimately, there wasn’t enough funding to expand as quickly as the city wanted, he said.

Divvy began with an influx of local and federal funds, which had mostly run out by 2019, before Lyft purchased the system’s operator and poured in cash. Advertisement “Personally, as someone who has worked on Divvy, I would have loved to have seen it go faster,” he said. “But, realistically, with the resources we had we did the best we could.

” Divvy has faced its share of challenges, said Jim Merrell, managing director of advocacy for the Active Transportation Alliance. Delays in citywide expansion have been problematic, and more and better bike lanes are needed to get more people cycling, he said. But there have been key successes.

Divvy entering a neighborhood can create demand for bike lanes on roads, which might otherwise be met with resistance from residents, he said. Another key success of Divvy has been in “socializing” e-bikes, he said. They present an opportunity to shift more people out of cars and into more environmentally-friendly modes of transportation, but price is still a sticking point.

The city should consider subsidizing Divvy e-bikes the way public transit is subsidized to make the cost more attainable, he said. “From our perspective it’s definitely been a success in providing a new tool and option for people,” he said. “But always, we think we can do better in terms of expanding access, both just where bikes and stations are located, how readily available those bikes and stations are, and then critically how affordable they are.

” sfreishtat@chicagotribune. com Advertisement cmalon@chicagotribune. com.