Inside Montreal, journalist Louis-Philippe Messier travels mainly on the run, his office in his backpack, on the lookout for fascinating subjects and people. He speaks to everyone and is interested in all walks of life in this urban chronicle.
Ten years after the arrival of BIXI in Montreal, the city of Quebec launched more extensively this summer its own system of self-service bicycles adapted to its many ultra-steep streets. And I preferred…
The Quebec one! It’s not called BIXI, but àVélo. These gears are not gunmetal gray or pale blue, but black.
Montrealers on a trip to Quebec will not be disoriented by this model, which is modeled fairly closely on that of the metropolis, since these frames are also E-Fit manufactured by Cycles Devinci.
The main difference between the two services?
In Quebec, there are only electric bikes… otherwise they would all quickly end up in lower town!
Photo Louis-Philippe Messier
The àVélo bike-sharing system is similar to that of BIXI.
Who would have the courage and the strength to defy gravity by going up a 45-degree slope on a “heavy” mechanical bicycle like a BIXI?
Even in Montreal, a city with a relatively flat terrain, mechanical BIXIs have an unfortunate tendency to go down much more often than they go up.
Easier
After a brief trial period of ten stations and one hundred mounts last summer, àVélo took the nation’s capital by storm this summer with 40 stations and 400 bikes.
Already, in touristic Quebec, we see them circulating everywhere.
“Next year, there will be 70 stations and 700 bikes, then, in 2024, 100 stations and 1,000 bikes,” explains Brigitte Lemay, from the Capital Transport Network.
When I saw two smiling seniors pedaling up hills with ease on àVélo, I felt a burst of optimism for the future of this service.
Having walked a lot in Quebec, I know it’s not easy.
Photo Louis-Philippe Messier
Catherine Bonneau recently subscribed.
This is why, even if àVélo is not likely to catch up with the 600 BIXI stations anytime soon, I predict a relatively greater success due to the difficult slopes to climb on foot.
If it’s easier and faster to climb hills with àVélo than on two legs, that’s guaranteed popularity.
Test
On rue Saint-Jean, I place myself on my àVélo at the bottom of rue Claire-Fontaine, the slope of which seems to me to be about 40 degrees.
For this test, no momentum. In first gear, with engine assistance, I climb the 50 meters without difficulty… although I have to provide some effort towards the end.
It would have been more tiring to climb it on foot.
At the top of the hill, I question a “àVéloiste” who passes by.
“I subscribed for a month because friends encouraged me to do so and it’s really fun,” says Catherine Bonneau, manager of Les Gros Becs theatre.
“It will be much more convenient when the network is more extensive. »
Differences
Unlike BIXIs, àVélos are equipped with chains to lock them somewhere and a QR code for quick unlocking.
As in Montreal, employees are needed to change dead batteries.
After my experience, I wonder why the strength of the àVélo assistance motor is not even greater than at present.
When even the long steep climbs of Quebec will be easy for a clientele not necessarily in good shape, the battle will be won.