New Haven is a great city for biking, but for many lower-income students at Yale, the cost of buying a bike and the required gear can put this form of sustainable transit out of reach.
Recognizing this barrier, Yale undergraduate Nicholas Perez ’24 set out in 2021 to create a student-run bike share program that would provide free bike rentals to students. After eight months of planning, Perez secured the funds to purchase five used bicycles from the Bradley Street Bicycle Co-op and launched Equitable Bikeshare @ Yale (EB@Y) as a pilot at Pierson College.
With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, previous New Haven bike-share programs that relied on ads and membership subscriptions were suspended indefinitely. Rather than trying to replicate a commercial-style program, Perez decided to start small and scale up—a return to a more community-oriented model.
Perez says EB@Y—which is a collaboration between Yale Student Environmental Coalition and Yale College Council—aims to build a thriving bike culture at Yale that promotes student health, makes sustainable modes of transportation more accessible, and encourages Yale students to explore New Haven.
“Living here changed for me once I had my bike,” says Perez, a junior majoring in environmental studies and political science. “I was able to go to Science Hill or bike to Chittenden Hall, and it wasn’t hard. I could go to East Rock and check out the cool markets and parks.”
Through the EB@Y website, Yale students can schedule free bicycle rentals that last from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. seven days a week. One-day loans come with everything a rider needs: a helmet, bike lights, a bike cover, and a lock. At 10 p.m. each night, student volunteers check over and test ride each bike to ensure it’s safe and prepare for the following day’s rental.
Aside from two flat tires, Perez says there have been remarkably few glitches. “One concern was that students would treat bikes badly because they were free-of-charge. That hasn’t been an issue. Students have been great about taking care of the bikes.”
After a successful pilot that saw more than 70 free bike rentals, EB@Y is preparing to expand to four additional colleges this month: Berkeley, Franklin, Timothy Dwight, and Morse. Each will have three bikes, of varying sizes to accommodate students’ needs.
In the long term, Perez hopes to scale-up the bike share to all of Yale’s 14 residential colleges. He’s crunched the numbers and puts the cost at $1,900, plus annual maintenance fees starting in year three, for a college to adopt a bikeshare.
“I hope that we can reduce barriers to biking and bring in as many people as possible,” he says. “We want the bikeshare to be thought of like the gym or buttery at Yale: an amenity that is free to students that improves their quality of life, something the college can keep up year after year.”
Did you know: Yale offers bicycle safety training courses to encourage safe cycling on campus and around New Haven. Courses are offered from March through October and cover state and local laws pertaining to cyclists, accident avoidance, bicycle tips and maintenance, and proper use and sizing of helmets. Learn more and sign up for Bicycle Safety Training.
Each month, Yale Sustainability features a ‘Sustainability Champion of the Month’—a student, staff, or faculty member who is leading the charge toward a more sustainable campus. If you know a sustainability champion at Yale, email sustainability@yale.edu and tell us about them.