Seattle Bike Share 3.0

After the demise of Pronto Cycle Share, private bike-share purveyors—many of them dockless—started eying Seattle. Dockless bike share programs differ from Pronto in many ways, but the biggest headline: They don’t use stations or docks. This makes them lower-cost than traditional station-based or partially-stationed programs. Think of them, for the most part, like the Car2Go to Pronto’s ZipCar.

Initially, the Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) operated a pilot program that governed how private companies operated their bike shares. Now, the city is working on implementing a long-term set of rules.

We profiled the companies that we know of so far—including those that have already passed through the city and those that are on their way.