April roll out for new bike hire scheme

The much-anticipated Bike for Hire scheme is expected to get underway in both Athlone and Mullingar next month.

This was the good news imparted to local councillors at the March meeting of Athlone Moate Municipal District in response to a question from Cllr Frankie Keena, who has been pushing for a roll-out of the scheme in time for this year’s tourist season.

In its response to Cllr Keena’s question, Westmeath County Council said it was “on programme” to introduce a pilot bike hire scheme for Mullingar and Athlone over the coming months. The council is working closely with Moby Bikes Ireland, who were awarded the contract, on the planning and roll out of the scheme, with an expected start date “in April 2022” according to the council response. Previously, the council indicated that the scheme would be put in place in the county’s two largest towns for an initial six-month trial period between April 1 and September 30. "The option of making the scheme permanent will be considered based on the overall success of the six-month trial," said the council.

Like similar schemes in cities such as Dublin and Galway, an "app-based system" is due to be used by the public to hire a bicycle.

"The app will need to be free to install on all mobile devices and allow users to quickly sign up to hire a bicycle," stated the council.

It said the app should be able to “control the locking and unlocking of the bicycle fleet” and should also “facilitate the payment for hires using all major credit or debit cards.”

A minimum of 30 bikes is due to be provided across at least six locations in Athlone and Mullingar, while the council said it wanted to set a '€1 per hour' cost to the public for hiring a bike.