Bicycle Rental in London: OYBike

You may remember I wrote about renting a bicycle in Paris and what a great idea I thought that was. It's much cheaper than the metro, more ecological and definitely more fun. So, you can imagine my excitement when I came across something similar in London the other day. See, like many young, single, working Londoners, I live in a studio. I can't get my own bike - there is just no space for it!

I saw one of these in Hammersmith and later in Shepherd's Bush. Well, in Paris the rental stations are on every corner and each one of them has at least 10 - 20 bikes. So this is a slow start. But it is a start, nevertheless! I decided to investigate ...

The company is called OYBike and here is a map of the locations where these bikes are available: http://oybike.com/OYBIKE/obhome.nsf/locations.html

Most are in west London and it seems that there are unfortunately no central London locations. They charge an initial £10 registration fee which is given to you as credit for future rentals. All rentals are free as long as you return the bike within 30 minutes, after that you are charged depending on the amount of time you use the bike.

Now the big question: Am I brave enough to tackle London's traffic?