Bike Angel Points Harder to Acquire

Anyone else notice just how difficult it’s become to get Bike Angels points? Seems there are lots of points to be had in certain areas of the city, but they’re almost always exclusively drop off points and not for angels to take out!

Really getting sick of this. Not sure it’s even worth it anymore to participate. What incentives are there at this point? Things have taken a decisive turn for the worse since Lyft took over. There are obviously some angels - based on the leaderboard- who are spending significant amounts of time in a competitive quest for points. I’ve certainly seen 1 or 2 of them recently. Quite a sight to see.

MKL68
4 years ago
I find Manhattan is tough to get points (previous years had ridiculous points in Brooklyn like 10, 15, 20 point stations regularly....I never saw something over 8 points in Manhattan. I never was able to take advantage of the Brooklyn bonzanas...but slowly eked out 100+ a month. I live in Harlem and it used to be the top of the map for bikes so usually there were some points around Central Park or parts of Harlem but since the expansion all the stations are either plus or minus. There's rarely some empty and some full to move between so it's a lot more effort to try to find places to get quick/nearby stations that can be combined for points. It takes a lot of time for little reward (and then you don't even get the physical rewards....)

bcasey11
Casual Commenter
4 years ago
This is especially true on the upper west side. The lack of bikes is going to kill citibike in this neighborhood. I don't know if it is their algorithm or if they just don't care. Even right now, the 10 stations closest to my home have a TOTAL of 6 bikes. And, in my experience, these are in broken docks where the bike can't be removed.

Bike Angel since August 2017 - 4,456 Lifetime points
MKL68
Casual Commenter
4 years ago
I find Manhattan is tough to get points (previous years had ridiculous points in Brooklyn like 10, 15, 20 point stations regularly....I never saw something over 8 points in Manhattan. I never was able to take advantage of the Brooklyn bonzanas...but slowly eked out 100+ a month. I live in Harlem and it used to be the top of the map for bikes so usually there were some points around Central Park or parts of Harlem but since the expansion all the stations are either plus or minus. There's rarely some empty and some full to move between so it's a lot more effort to try to find places to get quick/nearby stations that can be combined for points. It takes a lot of time for little reward (and then you don't even get the physical rewards....)
TJ
Resourceful Rider
4 years ago
I don’t know how distribution used to work but there were times I would go to my station at 730am and there would be 8 ebikes and 20 regular bikes which seems like they were intentionally refilled, now my station never has e bikes and is rarely filled, there are all drop off points except in places like the west village. And the algorithm they use seems nonsensical. Some stations have 3 spots open but will have 2+ drop off points and some stations are literally completely empty and have 1 drop off point.
it would incentivize us to refill stations if they offered more points. They’re already charging us to use citibike and incentivizing us to provide free labor (as customers) for tiny amounts of evoke credits which just further incentivize us to renew our subscriptions. Plus isn’t the city funding citibike at least in part? And isn’t it advertising that again we are offering for free by riding their branded bikes around? So stingy it’s wild
- Sunny-dea
  Resourceful Rider
  4 years ago
  The upper west side is almost always a complete ghost town for all bikes. There are some days where I can’t get a bike in a 20 block radius.
  - MKL68
    Casual Commenter
    4 years ago
    That was me today because even when there was a bike at one dock, it wouldn't release....