For latest in bike-share fashion, head to DC

An excerpt

Available in black and gray, the backpack was designed by Rebecca Minkoff in collaboration with Bloomingdales to "help the chic city girl go about her day with ease," according to Rebecca Minkoff retail merchandise manager Christine Marconi. A zipper pouch for a water bottle and a key clip are among the bike-friendly features. The bags will be available for purchase at Thursday's party, which includes complimentary potassium snacks, Icelandic yogurt, and make-up touchups from Clarins.

City Bike program doors bike stores along its path, shop owners say

An excerpt

But the perverse byproduct of Citi Bike's popularity is its impact on bike stores like McCorkell’s. The very institutions that should be riding the success of a newly bike-friendly city are getting doored by it instead. For the neighborhood bike shop, declining sales are an unintended consequence of a program that most people seem to love.

Nothing like a morning rain to flush the Citi Bike system

Forgive us for this comparison, but after reading the spectacularly written obit of State Sen. Roy Goodman, we cannot help but blurt:  For the Citibike system, morning rain works like Ex Lax.

Yesterday scored a NotSpot 16, lowest since a Tuesday in the second week of January when we had a chilling all-day rain. Monday also tied the lowest number of empty stations -- five at 8:30 am -- that we’ve recorded for the year.

Empty/full stations day by day

Dad invents snap-on child seat for Citibike-type bikes; Alta moves to shut down his biz

The Blaze

An excerpt

But after it gained public attention more recently Wilson was told to stop the process of testing out his designs and selling the seats because they violate the program’s user agreement on several fronts.

The agony of dock lock captured on video

The Awl

An excerpt

Most people who find themselves in this situation spend some time trying really hard to make the slots work. They shove their bikes into them as forcefully as they can, hoping with every thrust that the mechanism will lock like it’s supposed to. But in the end, everybody gives up and rides sadly away.

Finally, a Monday better than the last

Monday was the first in six weeks to downtrend. Topped out at 76 NotSpots at 9:30 am

Week 21 summary: Mondays just keep getting worse

MONDAY

TUESDAY

WEDNESDAY

THURSDAY

FRIDAY

HOLIDAY

WEEK 21

65

WEEK 21

30

WEEK 21

37

WEEK 21

36

• Week 21 takes a NotSpot 43, showing some incremental improvement even though another Monday set another NotSpot record -- 96 at 9:30 am. That record has been broken on four out of the past five Mondays.
• We can’t quantify it yet, but we are developing this notion that Citi Bike is getting more aggressive about rebalancing.
• There are no Top 10 NotSpot station and neighborhood reports for Week 21. We are traveling and that makes data collection too difficult.
• Available bikes ended the week above 4000 and we’re sure that’s a good thing.