Bike share lands in seven more neighborhoods as Citi Bike wraps up its outer-borough push

Citi Bike has finished building out seven neighborhoods in three boroughs, the city Department of Transportation said Thursday. Riders in Riverdale and Norwood in the Bronx, Forest Hills in Queens, and Kensington, Bay Ridge, East New York and Brownsville in Brooklyn can now pick up and drop off bikes close to home.

The system, which Lyft owns, opened more than 230 stations over the last 12 months, with roughly 3,700 docks between them. Crews began in Bay Ridge and finished in East New York. Since the first Bay Ridge stations opened last September, people there have logged over 75,000 trips.

Where Citi Bike docks are now

With about 10 more square miles added, the network now covers 86.5 square miles. According to city officials, that footprint includes 62% of the city’s residents, and over half of all New Yorkers are within a five-minute walk of a station. Staten Island remains without docks.

Every new station is built on Lyft’s Pillar dock design. At the new stations in Norwood, Reduced Fare rides account for more than half of all trips, said Patrick Knoth, Citi Bike’s general manager.

Mayor Zohran Mamdani called cycling “one of the best ways to get around the city” and said the added stations help people reach jobs, classes, appointments, museums and concerts.

More docks coming to Midtown, Chelsea and Greenpoint

The transportation department and Lyft also plan to install hundreds of docks this fall inside the current service area. Demand there is so high that finding a bike, or an empty slot to return one, is often difficult. Gowanus, Greenpoint, Williamsburg, Chelsea and Midtown are among the areas getting them.

Pricing remains a sore point for Lyft. Riders without a membership pay $5.43 per trip once taxes and fees are included, and some City Council members are pushing for a flat $3 fare for members. Until the Citi Bike contract ends in 2029, the city has limited power to force price changes. Another complaint involves speed: after the city capped e-bikes at 15 mph last year, Lyft cut the top speed of its pedal-assist bikes from 18 mph, which makes rides longer and pricier for people billed by the minute.