I know there was one in Boston this morning but according to Facebook there is a ride of Silence in Cambridge at 6:30 this afternoon. Are there actually two of them today?

This 2021 Masters thesis from the university of Irvine, "Calibration and Validation of Generalized Bathtub Model with Boston’s Bluebikes Data" obviously used Bluebikes data.

Abstract:

>Most existing traffic flow models rely on data collection methods that require a detailed layout of networks with compilations of recorded individual trip data. Although these procedures have been reliable, they also possess disadvantages such as high computation costs and a lack of privacy protection. Thus, in search of a lower cost alternative that can also effectively protect consumer privacy, we analyzed the Bathtub traffic flow model as a potentially viable data collection protocol.

>To test whether concepts can be proven, conservation equations can be consistent, and outputs can be obtained with accuracy through the Bathtub model, I performed model calibration and validation on data provided by Bluebikes, Metro Boston’s public bike share program. The following components were tested: unified relative space paradigm, conservation equations, and Bathtub model. These components were tested through the following steps: data organization, definition of steps, Bathtub model selection, Bathtub variables, Bathtub relative variables, average speed, conservation equation validation, and model solution.

>The unified relative space paradigm unified the network trips using remaining trip distances. Bluebikes trip distance distribution showed a log-normal distribution, which failed to meet the negative exponential and time-independent trip distance distribution assumption. The conservation in total trips equation was validated with perfect accuracy, while the conservation in trip-miles-traveled equation was validated with good accuracy. The generalized Bathtub model solution also produced accurate results, where space-mean speed yielded the best results.

>Given the model’s novelty and potential for privacy-preservation and application, there are many possibilities for future study, such as: data collection protocols with the Bathtub model, compatibility with other transportation modes, and comparisons with reality. This study establishes the preliminary step in putting theory to practice, as we aim towards application.

The news doesn’t always have to be complicated or sordid!

The fastest way to get to work is the blue bike. All of my bags are too big for the rack to securely attach the strap. Sometimes it works on the vertical ones for never on the horizontal trays, which is most of them. So I’m looking for a new bag that I could securely put my pc, charger, notebook, badge in with the strap and get to work.

My PC is large IMO, currently 14x10 inches, but that can change.

Somerville, DCR, and the Mystic River Watershed Association are collaborating on an upgrade of the existing path along the mystic river along Shoreline Drive to Multi-use standards. Construction starts next month. This path connects to the Mystic River path network including a car free connection to Assembly Square.

The goals are:

• Improve access to the Mystic River for all
• Improve safety and accessibility
• Support ecology along the Mystic River shoreline
• Improve public health outcomes: enhance recreational experience and promote walking, biking, and rolling to get around
• Provide relief from urban heat

They will widen the path to 12 ft, improve green stormwater infrastructure, add new seating areas, and plant 86 new trees.

TIMELINE

2026

• June: Construction begins
• Summer: demolition, excavation, and underground infrastructure
• Early Fall: Install soil, plants, and trees
• Late fall: Pave path; Install lighting; seed lawn

2027

• Spring: Continue planting; install new furnishings
• Summer: Construction completion

One of the most frustrating parts of using the system is getting to your destination only to find the station totally full with zero empty docks available. Then the app just casually tells you to bike to the “next nearest station” — except sometimes THAT station is full too.

And there’s no way in the app to report that the station is effectively unusable in real time.

What makes it worse is that station density in some areas feels way too sparse. When docks are full, the next option can be surprisingly far away, especially if you’re already tired, late, carrying bags, or trying to get somewhere quickly.

A bike share system only works if returning the bike is reliable. Right now it feels like riders are absorbing the operational failures instead of the system adapting dynamically to demand.

Curious if other people deal with this regularly or if I’ve just been unlucky.

This MIT masters thesis in Building Technology in 2021, "On the Relationship Between Spatial-Temporal Outdoor Thermal Comfort Simulations and Bike Ridership" uses Bluebikes data:

Abstract:

>Predicting resident comfort throughout a city over time and predicting the impact of these thermal sensations on mobility mode choice are key information required by urban planners and policy makers to promote and implement thermal comfort concepts. The Universal Thermal Climate Index (UTCI) has been linked to outdoor activity patterns and used to evaluate the effectiveness of urban interventions to improve thermal comfort. However, calculating the UTCI at high resolutions in urban spaces is complex as it requires inputs such as the ambient temperature, relative humidity, wind speed and mean radiant temperature at the point of interest. This thesis investigates how simulating the urban environment at increasing levels of spatial refinement impacts UTCI values along three bike routes in Cambridge, MA. As a baseline, UTCI is estimated using data from a local weather file. Then, shading from buildings and trees along the routes are considered. Next, local wind speeds are incorporated from computational fluid dynamics simulations. Finally, surface temperatures of the surrounding environment are included. Subsequently, with the UTCI simulations and publicly available bike ridership data from Bluebikes, Boston’s bike-sharing program, the relationship between bike ridership patterns and UTCI values along each route is studied. Supervised machine learning models are applied to predict bike ridership based on UTCI and other predictors. UTCI simulation results show that incorporating the various increments of spatial resolution does influence hourly UTCI values and the comfort bands that they fall into, especially in urban areas. Incorporating local wind speeds provides the largest impact on UTCI values, and causes a 10% reduction in annual cold stress hours. While the increments in spatial refinement also impacts UTCI in unshaded and exposed areas, the impact is smaller than in urban areas. The statistical models trained to predict hourly bike trip counts based on UTCI and other demand and weather predictors achieved a root mean squared error of 1.02 trips. 48% of predictions were correct, and an additional 40% of predictions were off by 1 trip. This thesis demonstrates the importance of spatial refinement in simulating UTCI, and motivates future research into efficient simulation methods or rules-of-thumb for deriving spatial-temporal UTCI values. Future work into building a robust predictive model would motivate the design of thermally comfortable environments for human-powered transportation in cities.

Broadway Magoun Reconstruction Project:

Somerville held an open house yesterday and released the draft design for the Broadway Magoun Reconstruction Project. This project includes protected bike lanes (sidewalk level in some sections), narrowed lanes, floating bus stops, New raised crossings, and a sidewalk on part of the street currently missing one. There are 3 proposed designs for Magoun square itself: a roundabout, an X, and a T (I really like the roundabout and am least fond of the X, but all would be an improvement over the current configuration).

Here are the meeting boards.

There is a survey (available in English, Español, Português, 繁體中文,简体中文, Kreyòl Ayisyen, नेपाली) with which you can provide feedback until June 12, 2026.

East Washington Street Quick Build Safety Improvements:

Somerville also announced a new project for East Washington Street yesterday.

As part of this project, the city aims to:

• Create protected bike lanes in both directions on Washington Street by moving bike lanes next to the sidewalk curb and adding new buffered areas with barriers between vehicle or parking lanes. This may require removal of some on-street parking spaces. 
• Improve visibility of people using crosswalks by restricting parking adjacent to crosswalks (clear corners) at all intersections in the project area. 
• Enhance bus rider experience by evaluating bus stops for potential relocation or consolidation to improve accessibility and reduce delay. 
• Reduce transit delay by evaluating existing bus lanes for potential reconfiguration or extension. 
• Work with residents and businesses to identify where updates can be made to parking regulations on Washington Street and side streets to work better for people who live, work, visit, and shop in the area.

There will be a virtual meeting for this project on June 17th at 6 PM. Registration link.

Somerville Avenue Quick-Build Safety Improvements:

Continuing the momentum, today, the city announced a public meeting for the Somerville Avenue Quick-Build Safety Improvements project on Tuesday, June 9, 5:30 – 7:30 p.m. at Conway Park.

As part of this project, the city aims to:

• Create protected bike lanes in both directions on Somerville Avenue by moving bike lanes next to the sidewalk curb and adding new buffered areas with barriers between vehicle or parking lanes. This will require removal of some on-street parking spaces. 
• Improve visibility of people using crosswalks by restricting parking adjacent to crosswalks (clear corners) at all intersections in the project area.
• Enhance bus rider experience by evaluating bus stops for potential relocation or consolidation to improve accessibility and reduce delay.
• Work with residents and businesses to identify where updates can be made to parking regulations on Somerville Avenue and side streets to work better for people who live, work, visit, and shop in the area.

>Municipal investment expands the electric fleet and introduces dock-based charging stations, alongside new commitments for reliability

>BOSTON — Mayor Michelle Wu, joined by leaders from Cambridge, Somerville, and the ten other Bluebikes municipalities, announced a new five-year contract with Lyft to operate the Bluebikes regional bike share system. Following a competitive Request for Proposals (RFP) process led by the Metropolitan Area Planning Council (MAPC), the agreement centers on an expansion of electric mobility, featuring a significant public investment in the ebike fleet and charging stations. The new contract also removes barriers to system growth by eliminating monthly operations fees for all participating municipalities.

>The expansion, which leverages funding from federal, state, and local sources, will greatly increase access to ebikes in the Bluebikes system in response to high demand from riders since ebikes were introduced in December 2023. To facilitate this growth, the municipalities will be installing the first charging stations in the Bluebikes network. This transition to dock-based charging at high-ridership stations will ensure higher ebike availability, reduce van trips needed to swap batteries, and increase system efficiency. Funding will also support expansion of the overall Bluebikes network, with plans for over 200 new and replacement stations as well as new classic bikes to densify and expand the bike share network. The first 100 new ebikes will be rolled out by the end of April.

>“Over the past two years, we’ve invested in a 40% expansion of the Bluebikes network across Boston,” said Mayor Michelle Wu of the City of Boston. “This reflects the growing demand for public transportation by bike, and responds to feedback from residents calling for expanded mobility options. This new contract delivers what riders need: enhanced access and service, upgraded stations, and greater availability of e-bikes.”

>To ensure the system meets the needs of daily commuters, the new contract implements strengthened service commitments across the board. Lyft is required to meet higher performance standards to keep bikes available when and where riders need them — reducing the occurrence of empty or full stations, ensuring more balanced distribution of ebikes throughout the system, and improving overall bike availability through faster response times for maintenance and repairs.

>Previously, participating Bluebikes municipalities that joined the system after 2017 paid monthly operations fees for each dock they owned. Under the new contract, revenue sharing has been restructured to eliminate these monthly operations fees for all participating municipalities, reducing public costs associated with station expansion.

>Bluebikes will also lead regional road safety efforts through a new Safety & Education initiative. This includes a commitment to 60+ community events annually and quarterly bike education classes to ensure riders of all experience levels can navigate city streets confidently.

>The following price increases will take effect for casual riders, while Annual Membership, member per-minute ebike, and income-eligible membership rates remain unchanged at this time.

• Single Trip Unlock Fee: $3.00
• Day Pass: $11.99
• Single Trip and Day Pass Per-Minute Rates: $0.33/minute (includes all ebike ride/reservation minutes and classic ride overages).

>“With more than two million Bluebikes trips starting or ending in Cambridge each year, demand for bike share continues to grow,” said Yi-An Huang, Cambridge City Manager. “In Cambridge we're continuing to invest in Bluebikes and safer streets. This agreement strengthens regional partnerships, removes barriers to expansion, and supports system growth. As ebike use continues to rise, expanding electric fleets and charging infrastructure is key to meeting demand and supporting sustainable travel across the Commonwealth.”

>Somerville Mayor Jake Wilson said, "Bike share gives residents and visitors a fun, sustainable way to get around and helps us build a greener regional transit system. Somerville is proud to continue our investment in Bluebikes and to keep working with our neighbors, Lyft, and Blue Cross Blue Shield to ensure this publicly owned system stays affordable and accessible. A big thank you to our regional partners at MAPC, the Boston Region MPO, and MassDOT for helping secure critical public funding. With new stations and great partnerships, there's a lot to celebrate. Bike share is good for our health, good for the climate, and great for our communities."

>"Bluebikes ridership has increased by 35 percent since 2021," said Lizzi Weyant, MAPC's Executive Director. "As the number of bikes and stations increase, and expand into new municipalities, we're hoping to achieve 9 million annual trips by 2031. This not only increases mobility options across Greater Boston, it also reduces traffic and associated pollution."

>For more information, visit Bluebikes.com.

>About Bluebikes Bluebikes is public transportation by bike. Owned by the Cities of Boston, Cambridge, Somerville, Everett, Chelsea, Newton, Revere, Watertown, Salem, Malden, Medford and the Towns of Arlington and Brookline, it is a fully integrated regional system with nearly 600 stations and thousands of bikes. Since its launch in 2011 through 2025, Bluebikes has seen over 32 million trips taken by residents and visitors alike.

>Kudos to Councilor Ben Weber of Jamaica Plain and his City Council colleagues for demanding answers to the city’s prolonged pause on street safety projects in an April 22 hearing. What began as a 30-day review has now stretched beyond a year, with inexplicable silence and mounting delays to urgently needed safety improvements.

>At that hearing, Interim Chief of Streets Nick Gove shared one particularly troubling revelation: the city has decided to remove planned bike lanes from its Egleston Square Redesign project.

>There is currently no safe way for bicyclists to get from the Southwest Corridor to Egleston Square and Franklin Park, an obvious gap this project was meant to close. With the White Stadium renovation, the need is even greater: both BPS students and thousands of professional women’s soccer fans will need a way to safely bike to the stadium.

>This also affects me personally. Two years ago, I was struck by a car while biking up School Street – one of the streets slated to receive a bike lane in this project. That lane would make the street safer for everyone who uses it.

>This project, which is also supposed to include numerous traffic calming and street redesign components, has been in development for over five years. It has included extensive community outreach and feedback. To make such a dramatic change after such an extended process is deeply disappointing. The city should follow through on its commitment to safety and restore these needed protections.