Recent Discussions
Points distributions
I live and mostly bike in Oakland, CA. many days there are few points to be had anywhere. Contrast to San Francisco where there’s a points available everywhere. This hasn’t always been the case — and I assume there is various attempts to balance the algorithm, and that overall traffic numbers drive that One suggestion which might help a little bit is that stations with 1 or fewer open docks should always get extra points for taking something away. And completely empty stations should always offer extra. A full station are no bikes mean that someone isn’t going to land their bike there or even use a bike i have had many occasions where i’ve opened up a dock only to have it immediately filled. When points were distributed differently, I might go out of my way to help out. But with just 1 point on offer, I don’t. This should be a baseline not algorithmically determined, if you trully want to incentivize people helping out.
Divvy Cash for Points Please
Thank you. Please, implement Divvy points for cash as is available in some other markets. Please, would someone here with the ability to forward, request, argue, beg, the people who make Lyft decisions make this happen. Thank you. In a few days I banked enough points for a years worth of membership extensions. Since those days, I have not been on a Divvy Bike Angels ride. Sure, not much different than just riding for 80pts a month, but if there was a cash incentive, or some other options to redeem Lyft credits, I'd be out redistributing bikes everyday. Just saying. Thank you.
Streak system issues and potential tweaks
As a casual bike angel, I’ve recently come across a particular annoyance I’ve had with the current streak system that has the potential to penalize riders for taking more positive rides earlier in the day rather than spreading them out. Here’s a situation that happens to me often, and causes me to lose my streak by taking extra rides. If it’s the early evening and I have one more positive ride required to reach my goal, the situation often arises that after taking the ride, my schedule the following day is shifted later, causing me to be unable to reach 4 rides before that same time in the early evening. Thus, I often will take a neutral ride and delay that last positive ride to later in the day in order to be able to reach the goal by the end of the next day. Ideally, I would just be able to complete 4 rides during every calendar day to keep my streak, and not have to worry about shifting the schedule or changing the times of my rides so that my streak resets at the same time every day. Here are a few ways I’ve come up with to make that possible: Personal Favorite - Completing the 4 rides could extend the timer by 24 hours instead of resetting it. Streak time would max out at 2 or 3 days (maybe more?). Going from 2x to 3x would still reset the timer, not add 24 hours. Pros: Doesn’t penalize riders for completing 4 rides early in the day, or in quick succession Gives extra rewards to riders who complete more than 4 rides per day in the form of extra time Riders can build up time and take a short break without resetting their streak. Cons Time of day of rides is still an issue, but can be easily mitigated by grinding to reach 48 hours, then taking 4 rides per day. Alternate solution: taking 4 positive rides extends the streak for the entire next calendar day Pros Taking 4 positive rides every day is guaranteed to continue my streak Cons Could be worse for night angels, or people who ride at weird times depending on when the timer resets. Taking 4 rides early would give almost 48 hours of streak time, taking them late would give only slightly more. There is a discrepancy based on ride time of day, which is not ideal. Alternate Solution 2: Every positive ride resets the timer, assuming the last 4 rides taken (including the ride in question) were positive, and taken within 24 hours. Pros Very similar to current system, just not favoring every 4th ride Wouldn’t allow more than 24 hours of streak time (maybe a con) Definitely better than the current system but not ideal Cons Streak could be reset if rides were early one day but late the next, this was already a problem though.
Point algorithm feedback
Here's some point algorithm feedback after seeing other citi bike members complain about dock availability in Red Hook, Brooklyn. The dock atPioneer St & Van Brunt St has 39 docks but yesterday, Sunday, Oct 20th 2024 at 9:46am, one minute after the 15 minute point refresh, it is awarding pick up points while almost surrounded by very full stations which makesno sense. This is befuddling to me as it effectively disincentivizes all bike angels from re-balancing bikes from nearby full stations to this one when it clearly could be used to free up nearby docks and improve dock availability.
Waterproof seat cover - source?
Hi all! It's starting to get rainy/dewy here in the bay area. I am looking for a waterproof seat cover to keep my butt from getting wet from the seat. I once got a freebie type w/ elastic borders that fit PERFECTLY around the BayWheels bike seats, but I have since lost it and have been using heavy duty plastic bags. Those work fine but less cute. Does anyone have a good source? Alternately, anyone up for making one and putting it on etsy?? I'd be a customer!Max points given to drop off bikes at FULL station for most of the day
Since I started as a bike angel in March 2024 I've noticed that the point algorithm, for most of the day, is awarding max points for dropping off bikes at the Manhattan station at E 47 St & Park Ave, which has114 bike docks.Seems like a great point opportunity with so many stations around it awarding pick-up points, right? Wrong, the station is completely full by 8am and the valet attendant will scold you if they suspect you're a bike angel dropping off bikes to earn points. I was told by the valet that my account would get banned if I kept bringing bikes. This is a long-standing algorithm bug which makes a bad problem of dock availability even worse and should be reviewed by the bike angel team. The fix is conceptually simple: the station ought to award points to pick-up bikes from this station to improve the lack of available docks, even with a valet present. Here's a screenshot showing the completely full station is awarding max points to drop off bikes: The completely full station remains a max point drop-off station half an hour after the valet has left:Idea: Always Offer Low-assist option for eBikes (next-gen)
As many riders know, the low-assist mode for next-gen eBikes is only available if there are no classic/acoustic bikes at the station. When you then scan the eBike using the app you choose between low assist and full assist. Citi Bike ought to offer the option of low assist for next-gen eBikesregardless of the presence of a classic/acoustic bike to accommodate. If you agree with this idea, please like this post to show your interest to the Bike Angel team. For me there are two reasons why I'd like to see this: Classic bikes have seats that don't go high enough for riders 6'1 or taller which can lead to knee pain for long or uphill rides. Next-gen bikes allow for the seat to move higher but more often than not I have to pay for this privilege because there are classic bikes at the station. On more than one occasion I don't get the pedal assist option for eBikes because there's one classic bike at a broken dock that can't be removed so I'm forced to pay for a full power eBike ride when I don't want to/shouldn't have to. To streamline the experience, this should be an opt-in option so that full-assist riders used to scanning and riding aren't burdoned by having to choose full-assist each time. Lastly, in conjunction with this idea, please offer users the pedal assist preference via the iPhone and Android apps (under Settings). For some reason it is only offered via https://account.citibikenyc.com/profile after logging into your account making it frustrating and confusing for riders who primarily use the app and can't find anywhere to update their preference:
IDEA - incentive for moving eBikes
Somebody posted that there is no incentive to move ebikes. I had an idea this morning for how to create an incentive. The algo could be optimized such that Citibike could recognize situations where Dock A was ebike heavy, but Dock B had few or no ebikes. Since it improves the network to more evenly distribute ebikes, the algo could temporarily "toggle off" all regular bikes at Dock A making them out of service -- which would create an incentive for Bike Angels to move an ebike in low-pedal assist mode (free) from Dock A. Since Dock B nearby had vacancies, BAs should spot that opportunity and move the ebike. Once Dock B got enough ebikes, Citibike could "toggle on" the regular bikes at Dock A, and return to normal system function. The only people who would be mad about this algo modification are non-BA users who go to Dock A hoping/expecting to use a pedal bike, but find none available. On the other hand, for every person who is upset at Dock A, there is probably a person who goes to Dock B hoping to find an ebike and is delighted to find one (assuming a BA moved an ebike there), so on balance, as far as user experience goes, this algo change should be more or less neutral over time.
