Wednesday, December 12, 2007

On-line Public Bicycle System Inventory


From our friends at Translink in British Columbia - a great way to compare bike-sharing program data on-line. Bike-sharing Blog readers are welcome to review and edit the spreadsheet to share their knowledge with everyone. Instructions on how to access the spreadsheet are below.


Welcome to the on-line Public Bicycle System Inventory.

This collaborative spreadsheet was initiated by TransLink (South Coast British Columbia Transportation Authority) as a way to compile comparative data related to public bicycle systems (a.k.a. bike-sharing, community bikes, city bikes, automated bike rental systems) and make it publicly available to anyone with an internet connection. This inventory will be useful for both existing public bicycle systems (in order to see how they compare), and for cities that are in the dreaming and investigation stages (in order to help them plan their own systems).

Housing the spreadsheet with Google Docs enables multiple users in different locations to simultaneously collaborate on updating the inventory, resulting in a document that is bigger, better, richer, more complete, and more up-to-date than any one of us could have achieved individually. We encourage everyone to contribute!

ACCESSING THE INVENTORY

Anyone with a Google account can view the inventory at: http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=prgOTp_HlpU8ZLIKlFDTiXQ&hl=en

· If you don’t already have a Google Account and need to create one, it takes less than a minute : https://www.google.com/accounts/NewAccount.

In order to add or edit information and contribute to the collaborative effort you need to have a Google Account AND you need to get an invitation.

· If you haven’t already received an electronic invitation to join the collaboration, TransLink will send you one. Just e-mail us here : pbs.study.translink@gmail.com

· Once you have accepted the invitation, you are free to invite others to join by entering their e-mail address in the « Share » dialog box. You can send invitations to entire mailing lists and there is no limit to the number of spreadsheet collaborators!

SPREADSHEET GUIDELINES

1. Enter any information that you have at your disposal into the spreadsheet, inserting new rows (edit > insert > row) for new cities and new columns (edit > insert > column) for new categories.

2. Whenever possible please cite your sources by inserting a comment in the appropriate cell (right-click on cell > insert comment).

3. So that programs can be easily compared, enter all currency-related data in Euros (with the original currency price inserted as a comment). For exchange rates, see worksheet 3 – Currency Exchange Rates (link at bottom of screen).

4. If you know of any towns or cities that are currently dreaming of, investigating, or planning for a public bicycle system but don’t yet have one on the ground, please add their information into worksheet 2 – Cities Investigating PBS (link at bottom of screen) rather than into the main inventory.

Thank you for contributing! If you have any questions, comments or suggestions on ways to improve this spreadsheet, please email:pbs.study.translink@gmail.com

Happy cycling!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

amazing idea!!!
way to go!