Bikes for Boston?

Is Boston getting ready for a bike-share program?

In a great article in the Boston Globe (and please note it's a Globe article--I shudder to think what the failure of the Globe and other newspapers would mean for the future of green blogging and in fact all information, but that's another post...), Boston's readiness for a bike-sharing program is explored in all its gory details.  

What might such a program look like here?  Paris has the Velib service that's been in existence since the summer of '07.  You can get a year-long pass to Velib for around $40, and a one-day rental for less than $2.  It's cheap, it's easy, and it's green.

Of course, those of us who've lived in Boston for any length of time know that bike availability isn't the only problem for would-be Bostonian cyclists.  Quite frankly, you need to get armored up like RoboCop to protect yourself from the drivers.  A successful program probably requires significant investment, not just in the bicycles, but in providing safe, usable roads and sidewalks and pathways.  Think about Boston in January, and then think about navigating the already treacherous roads on a rented bike.  There's still some work to be done here.

Still, it seems like excellent timing for such a project to take off.  It would be a great investment in public transportation, forcing the city to deal with infrastructure problems, employing everyone from city workers to bike mechanics, and just maybe making the air of the city a little easier to breathe.