Istria’s e-bike initiative is expanding – good news for tourists.
The Municipality of Medulin is introducing a community bike rental system which would use both regular and electric bicycles, and there are plans for the bike rental project to fit in with the system which already exists in Pula, so that communal biking systems would cover the whole southern Istria. So, by the next tourist season, in addition to Umag and Pula, Medulin will also have a bike rental system which will use electric bicycles, reports Glas Istre on October 24, 2015.
Medulin has launched a public procurement procedure titled “Introduction of the System of Public Urban Bicycles – Bike in Medulin”. The first part of the procedure will end on Friday, 6 November, with the public opening of the submitted bids. One of the conditions is that the system for leasing urban bikes must be fully compatible with the similar system in Pula.
“We would like for the Bike in Medulin initiative to fit in with the system which already exists in Pula, and therefore we have started the process of concluding agreement with the Pula city authorities. The basic idea is to allow users to return and charge the rental bicycles within the Pula system. So, it would be possible for a user to rent a bike in Medulin and leave it in Pula, and vice versa”, Medulin mayor Goran Buić explained.
The tender includes the purchase of ten regular bikes and four bicycles with batteries and electric drives, as well as two rental points, both equipped with charging stations and an automatic rental system.
Estimated value of the purchase is around 398,000 kuna, and that was the amount which Medulin used when it nominated the biking project for the competition organized by the Fund for Environmental Protection and Energy Efficiency. The project was accepted by the Fund, which will cover 40 percent of necessary funds. How much the whole project will actually cost will be known after the tender is concluded.
