Why Framingham's Bike Share System Never Materialized

FRAMINGHAM, MA — If you have some free time, head out to Northampton to see what might've been in Framingham.

For a few dollars, you can rent a ValleyBike and zip around without having to worry about parking. You can ride between bars and restaurants, or, if you're feeling adventurous, speed down the Mahan Rail Trail to Easthampton for a scoop of Mt. Tom's ice cream.

In 2018, Framingham entered into an agreement with the bike share company Zagster to bring 50 bike share bicycles to the city. At the November 2018 launch event at the Springdale Barrel Room downtown, Framingham officials hailed the program as a step toward a cooler city.

"I'll sum it up with the word, a community that's 'vibrant,'" Framingham Chief Operating Officer Thatcher Kezer said during that event.

Almost three years later, Framingham doesn't have a bike share system — and likely won't anytime soon.

The main reason: Zagster is gone. The company suspended operations during the rise of coronavirus last March. Then, the owners dissolved the company in June 2020, leaving dozens of cities and college campuses across the country without Zagster bikes.

But why didn't the bike share program come to Framingham before the pandemic-related liquidation? The short answer, according to acting Planning and Community Development Director Erika Oliver Jerram, is that Zagster never got advertising support to launch the program.

"Their business model relied mostly on getting private sponsors to underwrite the investment and operations," Jerram said in a recent email. "Ultimately, my understanding is that though several sponsors had signed on and others had expressed interest in supporting it if it moved forward, Zagster could not get the minimum number of sponsors they needed to make this work in Framingham."

Jerram said Framingham is looking at other potential bike share options, but most would require a financial commitment from the city. The Cambridge-based company SuperPedestrian acquired some of Zagster's assets after last year's liquidation, mostly related to electric scooters. The company did not respond to a request for comment about SuperPedestrian's plans for Framingham.

Zagster wasn't the first bike share company to go belly up in the U.S. The Chinese company Ofo went out of business in early 2019. Uber's Jump! bike share brand was purchased in May 2020 by Lime, which coincided with the scrapping of tens of thousands of Jump! bikes.

Apart from ValleyBike, you can try bike share in Boston with Bluebikes, which rents from hundreds of docks stationed across the metro area. You could theoretically rent a bike at the closest station to Framingham in the Newton Highlands and ride it to town — but it would take you about an hour to pedal that distance, and cost more than a commuter rail ticket.