Capital Bike-Share Station Removed By Trump Reinstalled On White House Grounds

WASHINGTON, DC — A bike-share station has returned to the White House grounds after it was removed in 2017 by the Trump administration.

The 11-dock Capital Bikeshare station was added to the South Executive Avenue entrance to the White House by President Barack Obama in 2010 but was removed at the request of President Donald Trump early in his term.

The District Department of Transportation said Thursday it has partnered with the White House and Lyft to bring the station back. Lyft is the operator of the Capital Bikeshare program, which is owned by the District government and other jurisdictions in the D.C. area.

The newly reinstalled station is exclusively available to those with access to the White House grounds and will not be visible in the Capital Bikeshare or Lyft mobile applications.

"I'm pleased Capital Bikeshare is returning to the White House," Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) said in a statement Thursday. "Biking is a sustainable, climate-friendly, socially distant mode of transportation that should be available to all in D.C., including those who work at the White House."

The DC Council recently approved D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser’s Fair Shot Budget, which included $19 million to add 80 new Capital Bikeshare stations and 3,500 electric bikes to the fleet. Under the plan, every D.C. resident will live within a quarter-mile of a bike-share station. The plan also calls for DDOT to initiate a pilot program of adaptive bikes for people with disabilities.

“We’re proud that Washington, DC is now one of the best cities in the nation for biking and that we have a growing population of people who bike to work — including the dedicated public servants who work at the White House,” Bowser said in a statement.

Installing the Capital Bikeshare station back at the White House “is an important symbol, setting an example for DC metro residents and people in cities around the country,” said Anthony Foxx, chief policy officer at Lyft and former U.S. Secretary of Transportation.

Capital Bikeshare has recently experienced a boom in ridership as the region continues to reopen from the COVID-19 pandemic. Capital Bikeshare ridership is up 30 percent in 2021 compared with the same time in 2020.

“I am thrilled with today’s announcement that Capital Bikeshare will be returning to the White House grounds. This decision provides an important recognition of the value of bike commuting in every single workplace,” U.S. Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-OR) said.

“With employees returning to the workplace and the realities of the climate crisis playing out before us every day, it is all the more important that Congress passes my Bicycle Commuter Act to reinstate and improve the bicycle commuter benefit for individuals in communities large and small,” Blumenauer said.