Department of Transportation Proposes Six New Upper West Side Citi Bike Stations

UPPER WEST SIDE, NY — Representatives from the city Department of Transportation proposed adding six new Citi Bike stations to the Upper West Side.

The proposed new stations reach all the way up to 110th Street, which would mean Citi Bike coverage would span the entirety of the Upper West Side.

The proposals were made during Tuesday night's Community Board 7 Transportation Committee Meeting

Here are the proposed new Citi Bike locations:

1. West side of Amsterdam Avenue south of 66th Street.
2. West side of Amsterdam Avenue south of of 79th Street.
3. South side of 87th street west of Amsterdam Avenue.
4. South side of 92nd street west of Broadway.
5. East side of Central Park West South of 102nd street.
6. South side of 110th street west of Broadway.

The DOT analyzed data and community feedback to determine where the proposed new stations would be, said Jennifer Sta. Ines, a DOT representative. The new stations would pull in bikes from existing Upper West Side sites, resulting in a net gain of zero total Citi Bikes on the Upper West Side, said Sta. Ines.

Want more Upper West Side news? Sign up for Patch’s free daily newsletter and breaking news alerts.

So how did the proposal go over? It turns out people are still mad about last year's expansion plan.

As soon as the floor opened up for questioning, one Upper West Side resident voiced their opposition of the 87th Street Citi Bike station west of West End Avenue. But there was one little problem. The station in question was approved in July 2015. Not the best way to start a discussion about the future of Citi Bike on the Upper West Side.

John Frost, executive director of bike-share at DOT, was asked by a resident if the stations were a "done deal," and he said "yes." After his answer, opponents complained that the DOT did not consult the community as much as they should have when they planned the Citi Bike stations.

The discussion then continued to be dominated by complaints about stations proposed and approved last year. City Council member Helen Rosenthal even showed up to advocate for the DOT and community board to re-examine stations approved in 2015.

"It sounds to me from the discussion today that maybe we want to re-look at some of the sites." Rosenthal said.

Rosenthal identified one station in particular — 94th Street and West End Avenue — she thought the DOT should look at, adding "I just want to sit down and re-think that one a little more, the whole area is dicey."

One of the more impassioned pleas to reconsider stations approved last year came from transportation committee co-chair Dan Zweig. Zweig said that last year's DOT outreach program was flawed and that community members could not effectively criticize proposed stations on the DOT website that gathered feedback.

"You collected all the information about all the people who liked sites, yet if you tried to click on something to put a criticism it basically counted you as somebody who like that site," Zweig said. "So you never got criticism. Yet you come and say, 'We reached out to the public with many meetings, we reached out to the public with the website.' You did it flawed."

Surprisingly, the six new stations proposed Tuesday were not heavily criticized. Perhaps people need another year to manufacture the outrage.

Citi Bike's annual membership fee is $155. Public housing residents, as well as members of certain Community Development Credit Unions, can receive $60 annual memberships that can be billed in $5 monthly installments. Since Citi Bike's launch New Yorkers have taken the bikes on over 29 million trips, Sta. Ines said Tuesday. Additionally, around 1.5 million memberships have been sold. On its busiest days Citi Bike sees 50,000 trips and individual bikes can be used for up to eight trips per day.

Community Board 7 does not meet for its full board meeting in July.

[Photo: Ron Cogswell via flickr]