Vale do Lobo will have 30 state-of-the-art electric bicycles available for anyone to use. The project “Smart Bikes”, by the municipal company Infralobo, was presented this Wednesday, May 9th, and the bikes should be available «by the end of next week».
These bikes can be found in five stations, for shared use, at the following points: Golf Reception, Vale do Lobo Square, Vale do Ténis, Dunas Douradas and Vale do Lobo Supermarket.
Until the end of this year, the use of bicycles will be free. Afterwards, a payment model will be studied, which may include an annual or monthly subscription, as he explained, to the Sul Informação, Fátima Catarina, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Infralobo.
Basically, this project aims to promote “environmental sustainability”, in line with the Municipal Strategy for Adaptation to Climate Change, which Loulé has been following.
The bicycles were developed by the Bewegen company, but the operations will be ensured by a national company, Wegoshare.
Although electric, to activate the bike's engine, the user must be pedaling. That is, even though they are electric, it will always take some physical effort to ride these bikes...
The launch of this initiative comes after another, which is already in place in Vale do Lobo and has been successful: the “Infralobo Smart Managment”, which allows anyone to report a related occurrence, for example, such as a broken street lamp or a badly parked car.
As on this platform, “Smart Bikes” will also be monitored, in real time, in an operating room, where it will be possible to know where the bikes are, their battery level, as well as how many are available and in which stations.
This information will also be available for users who can plan the trip before leaving home. Still, there are some issues that still have to be studied, regarding the privacy of the user and the information he gives (name or phone number, for example) when registering on the website to start using the bikes.
For Vítor Aleixo, mayor of Loulé, the launch of this project served to «show the Loulé community and abroad what is the potential and the historic moment that the Municipality is going through».
The initiative of electric bicycles, available to anyone, said the mayor, is to be “replicated” in other locations in the municipality, such as Quinta do Lago and the city of Loulé itself.
Photos: Fabiana Saboya | Sul Informação
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