Lancaster University

Lancaster University bike hire: upcycling the cycles

With almost 9,500 students commuting to Lancaster University campus each day, and bus services often at maximum capacity, we needed to find an urgent yet affordable sustainable alternative to stop students resorting to driving or taking taxis to campus.

We worked pro-actively with local cycle company I-Cycle Limited to provide a low-cost bike hire scheme for students that offers upcycled, professionally maintained, second-hand bikes for hire. These are bikes that have been abandoned and recovered for upcycling. The scheme provides all the accessories and maintenance and teaches students cycling safety, to make the scheme as accessible as possible and to encourage everyone to try cycling.

The scheme has proved more popular than expected with 110 hires in the first pilot year and enabled us to prove the need to scale up the scheme next year with more bikes, different hire options and more promotion of the options for students.

The project has been really positive to offer more sustainable travel options to campus, whilst changing opinions on cycling amongst the student population.

Top 3 Learnings

1. Working with a third-party bike company has enabled better technical expertise and training.
2. Communications between the University and students are crucial in establishing trust with our third-party partner.
3. International students often want the bikes outside term-time so need an option to extend the hire.