I rode the 5 Boro Bike Tour on a Citi Bike (it cost me $20)
On Sunday May 5th, 2019 I rode the 5 Boro Bike Tour. It is a 40 mile ride through all 5 boroughs of NYC on streets and highways entirely opened to people (or, closed to cars, if you have a windshield perspective).
I was part of the Planned Parenthood team and dozens of my friends and family supported the ride with over $1,000 of donations.
I did it on a Citi Bike.
When I did it in 2018 on a Citi Bike with no planning, I hit $35 in overage fees. My goal this year was to keep my overage fees to $20.
But first…
Why Citi Bike?
Make no mistake. I love Citi Bike. I don’t own a bike and I frankly prefer Citi Bike to the few road bikes I’ve tried. To me, Citi Bike is the Rolls Royce of bikes — comfy seat, wide tires that make the ride smooth over the awful NYC roads, upright style.
The 5 Boro Bike Tour is just that — a “tour” through the 5 boroughs on the NYC streets. These streets are, sadly, almost never car free. It’s not a race. To me, this ride is all about enjoying a tour through NYC with a perspective you’d otherwise never have: surrounded by cyclists, no awful cars, drivers, honking, fumes.
To me, Citi Bike and this ride go hand-in-hand… or chain on gear? What better way to experience the city than on a Citi Bike — a bike specifically built for riding on city streets, easy to handle, great for stop and go. It’s surprising that of the 32,000 riders, I’m one of a few, if any, who chose Citi Bike.
Along the way, other riders would sometimes notice my bike and register shock with a comment that varied between awe (“That’s impressive”, “You’re the manliest man out here”) and pity (“Did you lose a bet?”).
The physical challenge
Riding Citi Bike is maybe 1.4x as much work as riding a regular bike (I think?). As Theodore Roosevelt said: “Nothing in the world is worth having or worth doing unless it means effort, pain, difficulty.”
I normally ride Citi Bike from Harlem to Chelsea, along the greenway, twice a day when I’m fully committed to my bike commute. It’s 6.5 miles each way.
I’m not breaking records here or ranking on the Peloton leaderboard. It’s just a long, fun ride through NYC.
The logistical challenge
With a Citi Bike membership, your rides are free if you re-dock the bike within 45 minutes. For every 15 minutes over the initial 45 mins, it’s $2.50 (so, $10/hr). Every time you dock you effectively “reset” the clock and then can just take the bike out again.
Last year I rode with no plan. I just took a Citi Bike and winged it, docking along the route whenever I noticed a dock. In all I docked 4x with $35 in overage fees. (I asked Citi Bike before and after the event if they’d waive the fees since (a) this is literally the biggest biking event of the year, so definitely on brand, (b) I’m kind of providing free publicity since I had about 30 different conversations about Citi Bike by fellow riders and ( c) I did this ride with Planned Parenthood and raised money for them. But Citi Bike said no.)
Minimizing overage fees
So this time, I carefully analyzed the official route, the Citi Bike dock map, and the 4 locations I docked at in 2018.
The challenge is to figure out how far you can get within 45 minutes and I think I was quite conservative. My plan would be to dock frequently til the last possible location. Here’s the plan I came up with:
Rainy..
It happened to be pretty awful weather for a bike ride. Mid 50s which you can’t complain about, but consistent rain the entire way with the temperature dropping through the day. But, as they say in the Netherlands about biking in the rain: “What, are you made of sugar?!” I knew I wouldn’t melt. It was just water. Just a lot of cold water.
I don’t own any waterproof clothing. Just a jacket, regular socks, regular sneakers. Oh well.
Here’s an article about the day:
So I stuck to my plan and docked along the way. A few times I had to ride a block or 2 out of the route, which was no trouble at all.
The last place to dock before Staten Island was at Citi Bike’s old HQ at Industry City — 39th st and 2nd Ave just off the Gowanas elevated Expressway. I literally had to take the offramp from the highway down to the dock and ride back up.
Bring Citi Bike to Staten Island
For some reason, Citi Bike is still not in Staten Island. Not a single dock. Which meant that when I got to the finish line, I was basically on the clock.
Citi Bike & Mayor Deblasio really need to bring Citi Bike to SI, although first they need to bring protected bike infrastructure since SI is pretty hostile to cycling. Then this whole ride could be done end to end on a Citi Bike and could really show off just how complete the Citi Bike docking network is.
New challenges
This got me thinking. Virtually no one rides Citi Bike on the tour. But it’s not a race. So what if we came up with a few challenges for the cycling commuters out there.
- Lowest overage fees. This seems pretty straightforward if you spend virtually no time at the party at the end. It’s basically what I did and there’s not much to it other than following a plan.
- Fewest dockings with lowest overage fees. Rider who docks the fewest times with the lowest overage fees. This is a bit more challenging as it combines physical speed with smarter docking planning, which is tricky.
- Fastest ride. This one is simple: take a Citi Bike and see how fast you can do the 40 miles! Start and end time could be the ride itself or we could make it more interesting and use the time that you first undock the bike to when you dock it after returning from Staten Island.
- Most Angel Points earned. This completely changes how you’d do the ride as you could be docking quite frequently and sometimes off-route to maximize angel points.
