Madrid debuts new anti-vandalism city bikes

The public service is undergoing a major facelift with everything, from rebranding to easier payments, targeted to make residents fall in love with soft mobility

Yesterday, the mayor of Madrid, José Luis Martínez-Almeida, presented the new upgraded and expanded public electric bicycle system (bicimad) of the city. The public service includes a variety of new features, such as advanced bicycles, more stations and a new logo.

It comes as a serious claim to make cycling a truly viable and defined mobility alternative in the Spanish capital – which had been admittedly lukewarm to embracing soft mobility in previous decades.

The renewed network will eventually have 7,500 electric bicycles and 611 stations, all newly acquired, which include technical improvements and more features and whose objective is to significantly improve the user experience. Likewise, bicimad will be available, for the first time, in the 21 districts of the city, which will allow coverage to be extended to all the citizens of Madrid. 

Madrid gets serious about bikes

The expansion and technological renovation of bicimad is a project framed within the Madrid 360 Environmental Sustainability Strategy of the Madrid City Council, which aims to consolidate the city as a reference capital in the commitment to sustainable mobility and the improvement of air quality.

A central key in the bicimad upgrade are the bicycles themselves.

The new model, E-FIT made of recycled aluminium, presents a more manageable, ergonomic and robust design that substantially improves the user experience.

With a 250W motor in a central position, together with the presence of a three-speed gear system, they provide progressive assistance free of sudden inputs; the LCD display allows you to know the speed and the state of the battery; the battery, integrated into the bicycle frame for greater safety, offers up to 70 kilometres of autonomy.

What’s more, they feature an anti-vandalism design. For example, there is an anti-puncture system in the tires. There’s also an anti-theft mechanism integrated into the chassis or the integration of the wiring – both mechanical (brakes and gear changes) and electrical (lights and integration of the electric propulsion) - ensures robustness.

Maintenance is also innovative since the bicycles anchored to the station are permanently monitored and their status information is analyzed by a diagnostic tool. As a novelty for the user, they can inform about the need to service a bicycle through a physical button located in each of the station anchors.

In terms of the payment system, the user experience is also set to be improved. Payment will be possible through MPass, the single account system associated with all EMT services (bus, car parks, bicimad and bicycle parking), which includes important innovations in the payment experience, since it eliminates the need to preload the current wallet.

The user will associate a means of payment to their MPass profile on which the trips made or the subscriptions contracted will be charged.